When it comes to quality and safety in the workplace, there are many different methods you can use to ensure everything is as good, or even better, than it should be. However, of all these items, the 5S is the one that will truly take your safety and quality to the highest level ever.
What is 5S?
5S is a system that will allow you to organize and manage your workspace, so you can improve your efficiency. This is done by improving flow, reducing the process of many things and eliminating waste.
This system is currently in use in many warehouses, factories, hospitals and offices around the world, so there is little doubt about how successful it can be in the construction industry as well.
What does 5S mean?
5S means the following:
- Rate – Seiri
- Put in order – Seiton
- Brightness – Seiso
- Standardize – Seiketsu
- Sustain – Shitsuke
Let's delve deeper into the meaning and action of each of these subcategories.
Organize
By addressing the first 5S, which is sorting, you determine which items or materials you need to remove by sorting everything you have. There are many ways to do this, but the best way is to talk to everyone in your group and see if there are any faulty tools or equipment, which includes broken and non-working items, out-of-date items, and other items that are not essential to you. the work in question.
After removing all discovered items, you can determine how often you will use the remaining items. You can then mark these items as daily, weekly, monthly, yearly, and never. Those that are marked as never should be removed from the site, while the rest can be placed accordingly.
If you are unsure about an item, you should place it in temporary storage until you determine how useful it really is for the job you are doing.
Set in order
By setting your items in order, you are essentially determining which items to place, how many items to place in that location, and where to place them. We recommend always storing items where you can easily access them and making sure they are in easily accessible locations. Basically, it's never a good idea to store anything in a place where you have to move five or ten things before you get what you need.
You will want to group tools and all your other items according to how they are used and what jobs they are used for. It's best to color code everything as well, so you can find it easier in the future. This is also the time to ensure that heavier items are placed in a location where you or other workers can easily lift them without straining your back.
Shine
During the Shine aspect of 5S, you will spend your time cleaning to make the workplace safer and better to use. We recommend creating a cleaning routine, as well as expected dates and who is responsible for what work.
An example of a routine might include spending a few minutes at the end of each shift cleaning up and ensuring all of your tools and equipment are clean and ready to use at a moment's notice. As you go about your new routine, you'll want to check for oil spills, damage to tools or equipment, frayed cords, burned-out light bulbs, and anything else that's causing a mess or safety hazard.
If you can't see well in certain areas of your workplace, you may need to install new lighting, which will help with your safety anyway.
Standardize
Once you've achieved the three S's above, you'll want to create a system that standardizes all of your new hard work. We recommend creating visual reminders for employees and yourself to reference as gentle reminders. You can even assign a job to each worker or rotate jobs each week so that no one gets bored or relaxed with their task.
A digital checklist is also a useful tool, as it allows you to quickly perform regular audits and maintenance, while also checking which items have not been checked in the last few days.
To sustain
Keeping up with the work you are doing or sustaining your new levels will never be easy. However, there are four different things you can do to ensure this new level of quality and safety is enthusiastically received by everyone.
- To communicate
Have you communicated to all your employees about the new procedures? Is everyone aware of their new responsibilities? If you're not sure of the answers to these questions, it might be time to set up a meeting to make sure everyone is on the same page.
- Education
Proper training is required, which means you must ensure everyone is informed about the new guidelines and knows how to do everything on the list.
- Offer rewards or recognition
While you may think that your employees will voluntarily join this new program, they will accept it more easily if you recognize their efforts and perhaps even offer rewards.
- Time
How often do you do all these new things? Daily? Weekly? A month? Be sure to make the new rules clear about when everything needs to be completed. This also refers to your audits to check whether new procedures are working well or whether changes need to be made. However, be sure to allow enough time between the start of procedures and audits to ensure everyone has time to get things moving in the right direction.
These five steps should ensure that your workplace, your employees, and yourself are doing quality work while remaining safe. Yes, it will take some time to implement all these changes and no, you shouldn't expect major results in just one day.
However, by making small changes and implementing one of the five steps at a time, you'll see results sooner than you think possible. So start with the step that sorts all your items and continue until you check off all five S's on the list. We know you will be amazed at the results you see and experience as you work.
