Paul Buxton writes:

Is it ever helpful to define standard work in a service industry environment?

When I teach my MSc students I always warn them they are going to learn a lot of ‘tools’. I implore them to ask two questions of any teacher who teaches tools and then ask a further question of themselves: Who developed this tool, what problem was he trying to solve and then, do I have that problem?

Standard work is vital in manufacturing. It is important for planning (very common) and managing flow (all too uncommon).

In service organisations we are not concerned with these problems. Our first problem is how to absorb the variety of demand. We know that if we design against demand we can absorb variety. If we introduce a work standard, especially in the way they are most often introduced, we risk preventing the system from absorbing variety.

In designing to absorb variety, we need a different kind of control. We need to control and improve our one-stop capability and our end-to-end services to customers. If we control and improve these things we achieve our purpose.

In Ohno’s Toyota System, he insisted workers should write their own standards – something not understood by the tool heads – for standards are to be treated as always improving. In the same way, in service organisations employing Systems Thinking, you often will see job aids, design principles expressed (things people are trying to adhere to) and other things designed by the workers to aid them in their work.

Managers have a deep belief in work standards. Our private-sector clients are often cathedrals of standardised design. When they learn how their design both created and hid waste, they get curious about a better way, for now they have a better problem to solve.