STRUCTURED WORK FLOWS

A fundamental objective of Lean Manufacturing is the elimination of waste.  The challenge is the identification of the various elements of waste so that they can be eliminated.  Piles of inventory are generally easy to see – but may be difficult to get rid of – and making waste visible in some work areas can be more difficult than it sounds – especially in the office setting.

Structured work flow on the shop floor provides a disciplined approach to logically arranging materials, equipment and staff in manner that minimizes throughput time and makes waste visible – indicators such as accumulated inventory, excessive material flow time, workers waiting for work, delayed material movement and staff access to required hand tools.  Simply, structured work flows help identify where “non-standard” things – WASTES - are taking place.

The overriding objective in structuring work areas is to create continuous flows of material – or paper in the office setting – between all related operations.  When accomplished, any interruptions of the flow – aka, problems – become visible and signal attention is required to address the problem. 

It is essential, that each structured workflow have a balance of work – in terms of time to complete - at each activity within the process.  The output of each structured workflow area should be scheduled in synchronization with the schedule for the production floor or shipping function.

Structured work flow focuses attention n the overall production process from raw materials, to components parts, to final assembly and to shipping – assuming you don’t want to be a warehouse.  In many companies, making work flows visible must move upstream to the design team, project management and procurement to achieve improvements on the shop floor.

                              SEIRI                  ==>                   Organization

SEITON              ==>                   Orderliness

SEISO                 ==>                   Cleanliness

SEIKETSU          ==>                   Standard Clean Up

SHITSUKE          ==>                   Discipline

OK, more information than you really wanted to know!

Here are a few straightforward guidelines for creating structured workflow areas;

1.                  The staff working in the area or process must recognize the objective and importance of structured workflows.

2.                  All staff in a structured work flow must be able to do all activities/operations

in the process.

3.                   Structured workflows are developed through a team approach.  The team should be multi disciplined.

4.                  “Always better, never best” – the structured workflow is never complete.  There are better ways to accomplish the activities in the process. 

5.                  Each structured workflow should be documented, posted in the work area and updated as changes in the workflow made.

With experience, the structured workflow methods learned on the shop floor can be successfully applied to the office setting.  The challenges are greater - paper flows and thought process are harder to make visible – but applying scheduling techniques and the 5 S principles will achieve results.

For more information on how to use Structured Work Flows at your company complete this Information Request form and we will contact you to discuss your interests and improvement objectives.

Post Script – Improving an Engineer-To-Order company’s operating and financial performance can lead down many paths.  Clearly, using Structured Work Flows could be one.  Other paths to improvement include Process Re-Engineering, certain Lean Manufacturing Principles, an ERP System, Supply Chain Management and Performance Measurement and Reporting. 

To learn more about each of these programs just click on a button

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