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5 S’s Concept
The expression Five S (or 5 S) designates
a management tool developed in Japan around the decade of 50’s by
Toyota, used a lot in the quality area and has as main goal to organize
workstations, as a way to increase work productivity and decrease the
wastes associated to the business processes. For its characteristics and
goals, forms one of the first steps for an organization to implement a
management process of full quality.
This tool is also known as 5 senses sine
the acronym “5 S” derives from the initials of five Japanese words:
. Seiri (Sorting): use sense which corresponds to
eliminate what is not needed, separating it from what really is
necessary. This S focuses on the elimination of the unnecessary items.
One of the most used methodologies is the placement of red tags on the
items that are not needed for the conclusion of the tasks. With the
placement of red tags, it’s intended to identify in a way quick, easy
and with high visibility the items or goods that, from the start will
not be useful in a certain place and that can be moved to other areas.
. Seiton (Stabilizing or Straightening
Out): organization sense which means to place in order, keeping in an
orderly way everything that is necessary. After a first stowage of work
places, with the removal of everything that is needless for the
performance of the tasks, it’s proceeded to a creation of a new way of
organization of work places. What is wanted in this phase, is to
re-think all work form, always with the aim to increase the work
productivity, eliminating wastes of time and efficiency, which is
achieved by the performance of tasks such as: (i)
Identify the best place for the items considered necessary, so that they
can be easily used and stored; (ii) Organize the way to maintain those
items in the established places; (iii) Be able to do on an easy visual
way, that everyone notices when some item it’s not in its place; (iv)
Establish stock limits; (v) Define and implement indicators to monitor
the situation;
. Seiso (Sweeping or Shining): cleaning
sense that means the elimination of waste. At this stage, the places or
workstations are already properly organized, having only what is needed
and in the necessary quantities. The following step consists on
performing a deep cleaning, as well as creating control methodologies so
that the cleaning and stowage conditions are kept. Beyond the normal
cleaning tasks, should also be analyzed if the equipments are in good
conditions of use, namely in terms of maintenance, calibrations,
measurements, etc.
. Seiketsu
(Standardizing): hygiene sense that means tidiness, standardization. In
this stage should to be defined rules and methodologies to systemize the
maintenance of the initial work, as a way that there isn’t the risk of
going back to the initial situation. For that it will be necessary to
establish in writing the aspects to control as a way to achieve the
planned goals, being, level definition of minimum stocks, workstations
cleaning periodicity, dates for the identification of the destination to
give to the unnecessary items, etc.
. Shitsuke
(Sustaining the Practice): order kept sense that means discipline, with
the strict compliance of everything that was established. The last stage
of 5 S’s, consists on the performance of a continuous job in order that
the efforts and resources with the methodology of 5 S’s be kept, with
more and better results. On this last stage, the main worries are: (i) Assure maintenance of the employees
compliance to the 5 S’s methodology through communication, training and
self-discipline and (ii) Assure that the 5 S’s become a habit of all
employees. For that it will be needed to define a measurement system and
monitoring of the new rules and practices implemented.
Translated from Portuguese
by Susana Saraiva, Portuguese-English and English-Portuguese translation
specialist. Contact: spams@sapo.pt.
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