Article 19. Assumptions in work Measurement for Staffing
Staffing levels are infused with many relevant pressures that need to be balanced. Among them are: seasonal work, training, vacations, and special time off (bereavement and pregnancy). All of the above tend to cloud the staffing issue but none more than not knowing how long it actually takes to do the job. This can also be confusing because of a wide range of employee capability. New hires are expected to grow into the job while others my not have the capability or the will to master the details of the job. The key to Work Measurement is in finding an employee to time-study who has mastered all of the details of the job and may be the top performer in the department. It is easier rate this employee at 120% than it is to rate an inexperienced employee 60% and have the results come out at 100%. Where Work Measurement is not used employers tend to rely on history for decision making such as how many employees worked in the department last year.
This example of staffing I encountered at McDonnell Douglas Missile Systems Company demonstrates another issue. When I was making a preliminary assessment to find out how much time should be allowed to process engineering drawings from a new missile into work instructions in the Production Planning department. I encountered an eye-opening discovery. Although the engineering drawings were not finalized the preliminary drawings were forwarded to the planning department. I had been told that the planning was yet to be written and while I was interviewing an exceptionally qualified and experienced planner he simply turned in his chair pointed to the bookshelf full of volumes and said “its already done“. This one employee had somehow written all of the planning for a new missile and was doing it faster than new drawings could come out. The question occurred to me what are all the other fifteen planners doing. With experience and knowledge of the capability of machining processes and having applied all his knowledge from previous missiles this planner could do the impossible. Clearly management did not know what a highly skilled employee could do. A new employee would have taken months to do the same job because every decision made would have had to be checked out in the shop. If I had time-studied this planner even a high rating of 130% would have distorted the nature of the job but I would not have time-studied this planner. I would have picked an experience planner who better represented the group this planner was near retirement and no one could replace him.
My first job experience was as an Industrial Engineer doing time-studies on the final assembly line of the McDonnell Douglas F4 Phantom airplane. While it took only a few months to become proficient at doing time-studies. It took nearly two years for me to become proficient at balancing the assembly line but by the third year I had memorized all of the jobs on the assembly line. So when it came time to balance the assembly line I would balance the first part of the assembly line which was assigned to me and go on to balance the entire assembly line while the five other newer employees watched in amazement. In time the other five Industrial Engineers could be able to do the same. The problem was there were too many Industrial Engineers. The Defense Department had a policy of awarding contracts to the company with the most Engineers and no one was concerned about finding out how many were actually required. This was at a time when work measurement was only used in the shop areas and not in the office.
The conclusion is that work Measurement should be the basis for all staffing. It can be done using the above time-study approach or by using Process Flow Charts to estimate the process times. The other issues: seasonal work, training, vacations, and special time off, should be added back in on a percentage basis to balance the work force. Balancing the workforce where there is seasonal work means trying to schedule training, vacations and time off in off peak periods.
A significant difference occurs when reducing staff during budget cuts. The present method tends to lay-off those at bottom usually the most recently employed. The government reform method using WITs keeps in tact those employees that are actually doing the work and eliminates management staff.
