In industry standards are set for manufacturing widgets which are repeated day after day. The main purpose of the standard is to be able to plan in advance the work to be done including staffing and to determine the efficiency of the completed task using Performance Measurement. In government widgets sometimes are made but mostly you encounter repeatable processes to do a task which amounts to the same thing as manufacturing widgets. This may cover as much as 60% of government tasks. But for those who don’t make widgets the process of establishing a base for staffing is complicated and in non-repeatable tasks will require some time in the collection of data. The data can be used to support staffing requirements but because the base can vary it should not be called a standard nor should it be used for Performance Measurement.

I have indicated two main ways to set standards through Work Measurement they are time-study and Process Flow Charts. These two methods cover repeatable tasks very easily. Now for those areas of non-repeatable tasks where the processes vary in time I suggest this method for setting a staffing base. Select several knowledgeable employees who actually do the tasks. Have them collect data for a few months by recording each activity they do and the actual time to do the activity. From this data you can create the staffing base. This process is sometimes complicated but not impossible to do. Since this is a non-repeatable base you will have to rely on history for estimating the number of occurrences for budgeting.

In the most difficult instances the base can be created using a matrix of tasks and simply picking off those that apply to come up with a calculated base. A calculated base is most useful for planning the time length of the task for scheduling purposes and less for Budgeting. This is a one time calculation to aid in setting the staffing budget and for planning and scheduling but because of the day to day variations it should not be used for Performance Measurement.

Another way of approaching this problem is after collection of the work data look for repeated sets of processes of the same time length these become the base for some of the tasks or they may be combined into single processes and used for calculating the base for staffing. You may also look for key impact items (triggers) which make a set of processes unique with their own base. This approach is used also in estimating for contacts. See Article 54. Estimating Workload by Determining Impact Triggers.

Decision Making relates to repeated occurrences of the same type of decision process. I don’t recommend setting standards for making decisions. The the results of the decision is more important than measuring the time to arrive at a decision. The rule here is that important tasks are always more important than their productivity measurement.

A general rule for setting standards in a new area is that the task should be repeated at least several times before a standard is set. The first time a task is done can take as much as ten times the second time the process is repeated. Once standards are set they can be used anywhere in the state where the same task is used, that is where the task does not vary. They can also be elevated to Best Practices with recognition of those who developed the process. Why are Standards important? They can reduce budgets by more than ten percent.