The Place of the Schedule in the Modern Workshop.

It must not be imagined that schedule working is merely a “fad,” as one manufacturer once told me. If the factory manager undertakes the production of a certain range of lines, he find that careful tabbing of time often bring about a reduction, in two ways. Not only does it mean a reduction in time, but more often it means a reorganisation of work. At Otahuhu it was found that the renovation of a passenger car, from the time it was lifted off the bogies till its restoration to service, was practically a nine-day working unit, which has been adopted for this type of work. It was discovered that the ideal team for the actual painting was seven, a smaller team than the previous one, while at the same time the work unit was not relatively longer.

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Where repair work is undertaken, planning out schedules is even more useful, in that a continual stream of work is passing through. In shops where “timed” processes are carried out it is possible to give actual times at which “repairs” can be put on the road. This enables the works manager to regulate the intake as well as to ensure a steady working effort. the psychological effect of this letter aspect is enormous, although perhaps but dimly realised in many shops. Factory workers actually cover more by a steady effort than by long efforts alternating with comparatively long workless periods—times just “filled-in.”

Furthermore, it enables the raw material store to arrange supplies upon a more reliable basis. In the case of a small factory, where the “store” is supplying a steady demand for certain standard lines, such demand can be met with certainty because it is foreseen. Where the demand varies, where the graph for demand indicates peaks and depressions and irregular periods, “overhead” in the from of idle stores, makes production costs heavier than they ought to be.