Building Leadership Through Monitoring Quality Control

This week (July 9-13th) we worked on a range of projects. 

Our main goal was to work with the women at the Kodagali workspace to improve quality control. 

This week, we focused on quality control at the Kodagali workspace, where the women primarily screen print designs onto the cotton totes. Screen printing is not as simple as it seems. The women must make new screens everyday, concoct the paint, and print each part of the design onto the bags, one color, one side at a time. 

The women of Kodagali are prolific and have developed an efficient system in order to execute screen printing. They work fluidly as a team, and are each focused and consistent. However, we had detected some issues with “quality control.” In other words, there were often tiny mistakes, that in and of themselves would have been easy to overlook, but which were occurring semi-frequently. Things were occasionally printed crookedly, or there were slight smudges, or parts of letters were slightly deformed. First, we halted production, and with the help of Harish, we explained to the women the issue at hand. We had a range of examples to show them and explained that while we appreciated all their hard work, it was important to take the few extra seconds per bag in order to be thorough and to avoid such mistakes. We explained that while the mistakes were minor, for massive orders, there was an expectation to deliver consistent, quality, products.

The following day, we spent time analyzing each bag printed by the women. In particular, we worked in conjunction with one woman, with whom we examined each bag individually. Within an hour, she was not only noticing everything we pointed out, but was leading the bag checking process. Although she was one of the youngest women at the workspace that day, she began to talk to each woman, pointing out any errors they had made, and encouraging them to be more meticulous. By training her to detect any errors, whether it be obviously crooked prints, or slight deformity of letters in a language she wasn’t familiar with, she had the confidence to rise as a leader in the group, supervising and encouraging her coworkers.

Additionally, this week we visited another workspace, Banvari, for a day trip. Banvari is a small village of about 300 people. Despite its small size, there are 22 women in the village who work with Ubuntu. Currently, the women of Banvari sew the cotton bags that are sent to Kodagali for screen printing. Banvari is absolutely gorgeous- it is the colors of the American Southwest, the deep oranges and chalky reds of Monument Valley. The mountains and rocky ridges are surrounded by lush forests, home to wild elephants and tigers. Goal #8: Don’t get eaten alive by a tiger. Do interact with a wild elephant.  Next week, we’ll be spending more time in Banvari, as the workspace is newer than that of Kodagali’s, and the women are much less self sufficient. 

I also visited several health clinics in Kodagali and the neighboring town of Bannur. It was a mere reconassaince mission, and so I have only first impressions to share. Inshallah I’ll be able to go back with a translator at some point in the future and get a better idea of common ailments and treatments, the cliental, payment methods, etc. However, the overall initial impressions were interesting. The clinics were in some ways disorganized and unclean, with broken fans providing little relief from the heat, and people, presumably staff, in normal clothes, standing over patients who all looked zonked. In America, the fear of germs and recognition of the importance of sanitation has in many ways led to an obsessively pristine and orderly world of medical practice. Organization and cleanliness, to an often unnecessary extent, effect patient confidence in the doctor. While I’m not sure the details on how much general cleanliness of medical facilities effects the sanitation of procedures and practices, it was interesting to see how vastly different the conditions of clinics were in the region. 

Additionally, while looking for the maternal clinic in Bannur, I used simple charades to get directions from a man in the street. I indicated that I was pregnant and asked where I could find a clinic or a doctor. His first reaction was to ask if I wanted a “scan?” to see “boy or girl.” In light of the high rates of sex selective abortion and female infanticide in India, this was somewhat disturbing. 

OH! By the way! I rode an elephant last week when visiting Mysore Palace! Unfortunately they took our cameras away before entering the palace but that just means I have all the more reason to seek out wild elephants in Banvari..