Abstract:
Pmt. Amt. Sot. A/Tim. Prod. 1994 Vol. 20 ALLOCATION OF TIME IN MANAGING A SHEEP FEEDLOT IN SAUDI ARABIA B. SYNNOT 15 Hipwood Street, Norman Park, Qld. 4170 A 20 months period as manager of a sheep project with Hail Agricultural Development Corporation (HADCO) in Saudi Arabia is analysed using the definitions of work as described by Conway (1968, 1992). One of HADCO' projects was intensive sheep breeding and fattening (Synnot 1990) for which s it employed 20 persons from 8 nationalities. The sheltered feedlot started with around 4,000 local sheep of Awassi and Nedje breeds. After 20 months 12,000 sheep were in the project. There is a lack of documented use of Total Quality Management (TQM) in livestock projects. One of the aims of TQM is to evaluate work practices and improve efficiency. Conway in his description of TQM categorises work into the 5 headings: value-added, necessary work, rework, unnecessary work and not working (Conway 1968). In the sheep project the manager' tasks are categorised in Table 1. s Table 1. Definition of the manager' tasks in the sheep project s The reasons for the higher percentages under value-added and necessary work (Table 2) in Saudi are the hands on management style and amount of training. It could be argued that some of this time should be in rework and unnecessary work. The percentage under not working is the same as documented by Conway. The monthly ranges depend on activities like annual holiday. Conway' work is based on s companies in manufacturing and service industries in the industrialised countries. The results from Saudi show that this part of TQM is applicable in an Arab country and in a livestock project. Table 2. The average and monthly range of the time spent (%) on tasks over the 20 month period in 19891990 compared with the typical organisation (Conway 1992) CONWAY, W. (1968). In 'Waste Chasers - A Pocket Companion to Quality and Productivity', (Ed B. Dethier) pp. 65-72 (Conway Quality Inc: Nashua). CONWAY, W. (1992). 'The Right Way to Manage' (Enterprise Australia Seminar: Melbourne). SYNNOT, W.M. (1990). Proc. Amt. Sot. Anim. Prod. 18: 384-7. 394