CAN FIVE S HELP ME? (A common sense approach to improving quality, productivity, safety and profits.

What is Five S? Five S is a component of lean manufacturing that involves organization and cleanliness, and then using standards to maintain what has been accomplished. The term "Five S" represents the five stages of a Five S program: Sorting (Eliminate broken or unused equipment, tools and supplies.) Systematic Organization (Put everything in its proper place.) Shine (Clean up on a regular schedule.) Standardize (Make the above three steps easy to accomplish.) Sustain (Take steps to maintain what has been accomplished.) Five S involves common sense practices and is not very complicated. But until the 5S System was created, many businesses ignored these basic principles. What Will Five S do for me? We often put off cleaning up and getting organized because it seems to be taking away from the time we use to get "real" work done. However, the truth is that having a clean, organized work area improves productivity, safety and profits. It does this in several ways. (1) By reducing wasted time spent looking for the right tool or materials--thus efficiency and productivity are improved. (2) The work environment is simplified resulting in improved quality and productivity; reduced daily or shift startup times; and reduced maintenance and downtime. (3)Employee morale improves, which also results in improved quality and productivity. The bottom line is that your customers are happier and your profits go up. How does all this happen? That's what we'll be talking about in this article. Who Can Benefit from Five S? All types of businesses and organizations can benefit from Five S. Manufacturing and industrial plants come to mind first, as they often realize the greatest benefit from implementing the Five S's. However, any type of business or organization, from an oil refinery to a church--from trucking companies to schools--can benefit from Five S. Step One - Sorting: Sorting is the first step in making a work area tidy. It makes it easier to find things when they are needed and frees up additional space. Start by sorting through everything in each work area. Keep only those items that are necessary for the tasks done in that work area. Any tools, equipment, materials and supplies that are not frequently used should be moved to a separate, common storage area. Items that are never used should be discarded. Don't keep things around just because they someday might be used. The result of the sorting process will be to eliminate (or repair) broken equipment and tools. All unused items and materials, and obsolete manuals, drawings, fixtures, molds, jigs, scrap material, and waste are disposed of. Step two - Systematic Organization Now that only necessary items are in a work area, the next step is to organize, arrange and identify them. The objective is to have everything in a work area arranged for efficient and effective retrieval, and return to its proper place. Storage areas, cabinets and shelves should be located close by and properly labeled. Frequently used tools should be easily accessible and workers should be able to return them to their proper location with little thought. For example, put shadows or outlines on tool boards, making it easy to quickly see the proper storage location for each tool. We typically focus on things from about waist level up, so make a point to look at the floor. Paint floors to make it easier to spot dirt, waste materials and dropped parts and tools. Outline areas on the floor to identify work areas, storage areas, finished product areas, etc. In an office provide shelves for frequently used manuals, books and catalogs. Label both the shelves and the books so they are easy to identify and return to their proper place. Using color coded labels makes it easy to see which items belong on each shelf. Systematic organization is not limited to individual work areas. Your overall facility should also be systematically organized. This includes the use of easy-to-understand labels and signs. Don't just put things away. Everything should be properly marked and identified, making it easy for employees, vendors, contractors, inspectors, and emergency response personnel to identify their location, hazardous materials, piping, valves, control panels, major equipment, doorways, minor equipment, instruments, storage areas, offices and files. The objective of systematic organization is to have a place for everything and have everything in its place, with everything properly identified and labeled. This means there are two important parts to Systematic Organization - putting everything in its proper place and setting up a system so that it is easy to return each item to its proper place. Step Three - Shine Once everything, from individual work areas up through your entire facility, is sorted and organized, it needs to be kept that way. This requires regular cleaning. To go along with the theme of Five S's this step is called "shine". There is more to cleaning than just "cleaning". This step also includes inspecting. While doing daily cleaning it requires little additional effort to also inspect the machines, tools, equipment and supplies in a work area. Regular cleaning and inspection makes it easy to spot lubricant leaks, equipment misalignment, broken tools, missing tools and low levels of supplies. The result is that problems are identified and fixed before they impact the work flow. If these minor problems were not addressed while small, they could lead to equipment failure, unplanned outages or long, unproductive delays while new supplies are delivered. When done on a regular, frequent basis, cleaning and inspecting generally will not take a lot of time, and in the long run they will save time and reduce maintenance costs. Step Four - Simplify and Standardize To ensure that the first three steps in your Five S program continue to be effective, the fourth step involves simplifying and standardizing. One of the hardest parts of Five S is avoiding old work habits. It is easy to slip back into the old ways of doing things. That's what everyone is familiar with. It feels comfortable. A good method to help people adjust to the new way of doing things is to make the new practices as simple as possible and to use standards. Do this by developing a work structure based on standard procedures that supports the new practices and makes them into habits. It's also important to remember that standards are not static and unchangeable. As everyone--workers, supervisors and managers-- learns more, update and modify the standards and continually make work practices and processes simpler and easier. Step Five - Sustain The final step in Five S is to provide training and have ongoing maintenance of the standards. Don't expect to clean up, get things organized and labeled, and have people cleaning and inspecting their areas every day--and then have everything continue to happen just the way it should without any follow-up. Life doesn't work that way. There needs to be a formal system for monitoring the results of your 5S program. Based on the results of that monitoring adjust the standards to make improvements. Then provide continued training about the standards. When there are changes--such as new or relocated equipment, new work areas, new procedures, new products--that will affect your Five S program, make adjustments to the standards to accommodate those changes. Then provide training that addresses those changes. One of the major benefits from Five S is that it improves safety. A good place to include Five S training is as a part of your safety training. This ensures that everyone receives up-to-date training on the current Five S standards for their work area on a regular basis. Five S is a common sense, easy to implement method of achieving improvements in everything from safety to your bottom line profits. The next step is for you to move ahead with a Five S plan for your company or organization.