Is 5S Worth it?

5S implementation is one of the smartest things you can do for your business, no doubt about it. Your clutter will vanish, you will know where every single thing is in your shop and everybody is happier and more productive. What more could you ask for!

Seriously, if you have not made the 5S program part of your daily operation, do it now. There is really no reason, unless you are already highly organized and efficient. It could be that some exceptional manufacturing shop is just naturally that way, it does happen, but rarely.

There are obviously 5 parts to the program: Sort, Straighten,Sweep,Standardize and Sustain. Once you have understood the concepts and decided to implement them, you will almost immediately see results, really.

The first time I was involved in a 5S program was with a typical American plastic injection molding shop of about 10 mold makers. We had been in business as long as plastic molding was a business, so there was a lot of "stuff" laying around. It seemed that everything had a place, but only a few knew the secrets of where it all was. I was highly skeptical of this idea at first because I had spun my wheels for so long on every new program that the managers learned at the latest seminar.

Most of these programs just took our time and yielded little or nothing in the way of results. When I heard that it was Japanese, I got interested. At the time, they were decimating our auto industry and I figured they must know something we didn't.

What do you need to get started? Not much, mostly time and a will to do it. Once you learn the technique, it is a matter of educating your workers of the benefits and making it a permanent policy. It is essential that the decision come from the top down, otherwise it will be just another well-meaning program.

How long does it take? It took us about a week to actually finish the process. By the end of two days we had made a lot of progress, but it was essential that we complete the project entirely. I'm certain that things would have returned to "normal' if we had not followed all five steps. It is very difficult to change a shop culture, but it can be done. There were some guys who were very negative, but once they began to see the results their complaints disappeared.

Is it worth the effort? Yes, it is very much well worth the effort. The time spent as you implement 5 S will most certainly pay for itself in a short time. If you only added up the hours spent looking for things, you would quickly justify the expense; not to mention the satisfaction you feel from working in a well-organized and efficient environment.

Learn more about 5S implementation.