Industry 4.0

A Glocal Perspective

Jerzy Duda, Aleksandra Gąsior

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2021
• ISBN:
  9781000440904
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Business
• Subtopic: Human Resource Management
• Index: Business

The Fourth Industrial Revolution, also known as Industry 4.0, refers to the industrial paradigm bringing together the digital and physical worlds through the cyber-physical Systems, enhanced by the Internet of Things aimed to increase the effectiveness of human-machine cooperation (HMC). This book deals with issues related to the challenges of Industry 4.0 that are faced by enterprises and universities. Contrary to most publications on the subject, it covers both technological and business aspects of these challenges and shows how strong they are intertwined, bringing new value to readers. The book also presents new findings that will guide enterprises through Industry 4.0.

This book offers readers an in-depth discussion of important areas of enterprises' activities in the context of Industry 4.0. The first area concerns human resources management; in particular, what new employee competencies will be needed on the labor market, how to use modern concepts (e.g. design thinking), and how to manage multi-national teams of employees. The second area is related to marketing and covers issues regarding customized products. The third area is devoted to technical aspects such as autonomous vehicles, Internet of Things (IoT), radio-frequency identification (RFID) systems, and Bluetooth Low Energy (BLE) technology. The fourth area concerns IT systems, including systems that support work and business management, strategic information systems, and cyber-physical systems.

Aimed at researchers, academics, practitioners, and students, it will be of value to those in the fields of human resource management, marketing, organizational studies, and management of technology and innovation.

1 Evolution of Organization Management in Light of Economy 4.0 Challenges

Ryszard Borowiecki, Zbigniew Olesiński, and Agnieszka Rzepka

DOI: 10.4324/9781003186373-1

Introduction

The aim of this chapter is to propose ways of management evolution in the emerging Economy 4.0. The authors of this chapter have assumed that, under such conditions, the evolution of organizations is particularly important in the creation of a so-called “Teal organization.” Such organizations, which are characterized by the customizable self-management of its members (employees) in decentralized structures (Holacracy), are developing faster under those conditions that support agility, inter-organizational collaboration, and the intensive creation of the soft factors of an organization’s management due to the development of computerization and innovation.

This relationship is demonstrated later through an analysis of quantitative data from previous surveys conducted by the chapter’s authors at hundreds of organizations located in Poland and abroad. Immediately after conducting the research, we noticed a correlation between the research results and the formation of Teal organizations. Therefore, we intend to continue these surveys in the future to further our understanding of the impact of selected factors on the creation of Teal organizations. Prior to this, however, we strongly feel that there is a need to demonstrate our findings in this work.

Characteristics of Economy 4.0 in Poland

The 4.0 symbol is used to describe the Fourth Industrial Revolution, which is characterized by the trend toward automation and artificial intelligence. The shift is clearly observable in the modern era and comes after the First Industrial Revolution of coal and steel at the beginning of the 11th century, the Second Industrial Revolution at the turn of the 20th century (a revolution in chemistry, the automotive industry, and electricity), and the Third Industrial Revolution of the 1960s—the automation revolution.

Industry 4.0 was originally presented in Germany at the Hannover Messe in 2011 (Roblek et al., 2016, pp. 1–10); it is associated with cyber-physical systems (CPS), cloud computing (CC), the Internet of Things (IoT), and big data. Its main goal is to achieve accuracy and precision as well as a higher degree of automation (Thames & Schaefer, 2016, pp. 12–17). Due to the fact that it is a rather recent phenomenon, the Fourth Industrial Revolution has not been sufficiently described in the scientific literature. It is quite difficult to say exactly what form the aforementioned automatization will take (and even more so for artificial intelligence). The history and development of earlier industrial revolutions allow us to state that, according to propagators of this idea, it will be another great breakthrough in the history of humanity and, in part, the human activity understood as production.

Despite the rapid growth of automation in Poland, it must be clearly stated that automated machine work is generally more expensive than human work (as can be seen in the works of Schwabe, 2018, p. 65). Hence, hiring employees is preferred to introducing machines despite the fact that the cost of automated machines has been decreasing; it is currently more profitable to use automation instead of human laborers in harmful conditions (high temperatures, toxic fumes, etc.). The widening use of IT will significantly facilitate the functioning of modern organizations even though the use of the term “Artificial Intelligence” could be currently exaggerated at this time.

Undoubtedly, it is advisable to use the so-called Internet of Things (IoT) to an increasing extent (within the limits of economic viability, of course). These are electronic signaling devices that activate specific organizational processes (including production) according to the adopted programs. The world is on the cusp of rolling out an early fifth-generation IT revolution (symbolized by the phrase “5G”), which will enable much faster data circulation. This will also include specific relationships in the field of automation control (such as turning devices on and off).

In Poland, one should take the acceleration of automation development processes found in functioning organizations into account, including organizations that cooperate with companies from developed countries (the United States and Western European countries) and participate in globalization processes. It also seems quite possible that we will see the rise of a completely new type of organization—one that will use the advanced IT processes and advanced automation available in a given sector from the beginning (e.g., start-ups, IT, design, nanotechnology). It, therefore, seems purposeful to monitor these processes in the Polish economy and Polish society as well as to formulate postulates that will help stimulate the above processes.

In some circles, it is believed that the development of IT will lead to algorithms replacing increasingly large groups of employees (i.e., technologically advanced machines). It is believed that this leads to dataism (i.e., the inflow of a significant amount of data that requires ongoing processing, which can be carried out by devices using artificial intelligence):

The work of processing data should therefore be entrusted to electronic algorithms, whose capacity far exceeds that of the human brain. In practice, this means that Dataists are skeptical about human knowledge and wisdom and prefer to put their trust in big data and computer algorithms (Harari, 2019a, p. 32).

Extensive caution should be used in all forecasts, however. In 21 Lessons for the 21st Century, Y.N. Harari states that the changes will be more subtle in the foreseeable perspective of 20–30 years and that algorithms will probably not make as much progress as predicted in Homo Deus.

I discussed the merger of infotech and biotech at length in my previous book, Homo Deus. But whereas that book focused on the long-term prospects—taking the perspective of centuries and even millenn...