This is China! BLOG

The Toilet Paper Wars: Waste Not Want Not in China

Recently a friend of mine and I were having dinner. Stan (not his real name) commented on the rising cost of pork, and, in general, the rising cost of everything in China.

The conversation put me in mind of another friend of mine, the General Manager of an American operation in Suzhou. He had recently told me his latest frustration with HQ, back in the States. Seems that American standards should apply in his Suzhou factory to, off all things, how much and who should get toilet paper.

Seems the assembly workers on the floor like wasting toilet paper. At the end of each work day, the bathroom stalls in the lady’s room are cluttered with meters of unused toilet paper that has been spun off their rolls. Of course, not only is this unsightly, as the toilet paper sops up the water and dirt from the floor, but expensive, as well.

The GM set about asking his executive team of Chinese managers the best way to deal with the issue. The team unanimously chose to ration the toilet paper: three rolls per person per month. If an individual ran past the ration, they could always go to supply and requisition, as it were, another roll to see them through the rest of the month.

The key, the Chinese managers agreed, was that the assemblers, all having come from the countryside, all in their late teens and early twenties, had no sense of accountability. It was the company’s toilet paper, and the company was there to serve the Chinese - after all, it was a rich foreign company. As long as they did not have to pay for the toilet paper, there was no duty attached to conserving long, thin sheets of pulped trees.

All seemed harmonious after that trial until HQ received the results of an employee survey completed at the Suzhou plant. Out of a couple hundred employees there were seven who felt that being rationed three rolls of toilet paper each week was unfair. The Director of International Operations back in HQ wanted the GM to remediate the situation promptly: everyone should have equal access to toilet paper, as much as they require to get the job done, so to speak.

The GM was adamant, though: the Director was not on the ground in China to see how employees were wasting a valuable and ultimately expensive resource; as well, the GM did not take kindly to being micro-managed, especially when he had conferred with the Chinese core team, which had unanimously advised on the rationing scheme.

I told this story to a Chinese friend that works at a Taiwanese company in Administration. She told me she has to carry her own toilet paper from home to work; such is the tight-budget mindset of the Taiwanese in Mainland China, and such is their sense of the level of waste of the average Chinese in the developing economy.

Numerous studies have cited that of all the Asian nations that have fast-tracked their way to post-industrial status, China’s is by far the most wasteful. During Japan’s rise from the early 1960s to the early 1980s Japanese industry spent two dollars to generate an additional dollar; the South Koreans during their rapid rise during the 80s and 90s spent three dollars to generate an additional dollar. Chinese industry is spending four dollars to generate an additional dollar.

Much of the waste comes in two forms: corruption and pollution. At the root of both is a lack of accountability: in government, in industry, and at an individual level, as well. Without checks and balances in government to hold government officials to task, corruption is endemic. As long as government can make money from rampant, uncontrolled industrialization, there is waste: efficiency is not important, and neither is effectiveness. Instead, making the fast buck now before the music stops is of primacy. And individuals - taking their cue from government leaders and business “heroes” - follow suit. Accountability takes a back seat when “everyone is doing it.”

Eventually, the Director back in HQ backed down when he realized that the Toilet Paper Wars in the Suzhou factory really were something for the local staff to deal with. The GM also helped to realize that the American sensibiity of Equal Opportunity Usage could not always be applied to the wasteful ways of today’s Chinese society.

Whether cars, pigs or toilet paper, the American consumption styles with Chinese characteristics were far from the best way to run a company - or a country.

Bill Dodson
SUZHOU, China