Total quality applied to industrial hygiene and safety

Today we live in a very competitive world, where the production of goods and services is framed, due to stiff competition between their producers.

Throughout the times and after the industrial revolution, man has sought to try to produce more and less costs, through his companies and industries, being the same the generator of millions of jobs around the world.

Man himself has evolved many ways to bring his products as close to excellence, for this we have created programs that we call continuous improvement, which seek the total quality of products, starting from the beginning of the process.

In the same way, being the processes that generate employment, it is understood that the human resource is a fundamental part of it, and it is there where hygiene and industrial safety are an active part of it.

That is why in the following work I will try to clarify, explain the different Continuous Improvement programs and their relationship, whether direct or Indirect, with Hygiene and Industrial Safety and the Environment. and the need of the professional in Hygiene And Industrial Safety in this Producer and Consumer society.

Quality is the set of characteristics of a product that satisfy the needs of customers and, consequently, make the product satisfactory. To this meaning, an important complementary nuance can be added: Quality also consists of not having deficiencies.

If Quality consists of providing satisfactory products for the client, all activities through which this satisfaction is achieved will have to be involved in it, regardless of the place in the organization in which they occur. This means obtaining:

• The quality of products, the quality of supplies, the quality of processes, the quality of resources, both technical and human, and materials, the quality of management activities.

This philosophy, which aims to cover the entire organization and all its activities, is what we call Total Quality. But Total Quality (TC) is not only a way of thinking. It is, above all, a set of principles and methods that seek the goal of customer satisfaction. And at the lowest cost.

To understand CT in all its breadth, one must cite a set of basic foundations. Total Quality implies:

Orient the organization towards the client. Satisfying customer requirements is the main thing. With this objective, the organization must revolve around the processes that are important for this purpose and that provide added value. This implies overcoming the classic view that responsibility for Quality is exclusive to the departments in charge of the product or service. The action of others will have an effect, to a greater or lesser degree, on the final result.

Expand the concept of Customer. We can conceive of the organization as a system made up of internal suppliers and clients. Applying Quality means that the needs of the internal customer must also be satisfied.

Possess cost leadership. Quality costs, but non - quality is more expensive. If it is a matter of focusing attention on the customer's needs and expectations, these will be better met if the cost transferred to the customer is lower. This reduction of costs allows to compete in the market with real possibilities of success. Therefore, it is necessary to reduce non-quality costs.

Manage based on prevention. The underlying idea is to do things right the first time. It is better than the classic detect and correct actions. The need to apply control actions is reduced, minimizing costs.

Enhance the human factor. Quality is not controlled, it is done. And it is carried out by the people who make up the organization. All without exception. Therefore, it is essential to establish human resource management from the motivation for Quality and participation.

Permanent improvement. Quality has to be conceived as a horizon, not as a goal. Total Quality is not reached, a horizon is being pursued that broadens as progress is made. Implicit here is this idea of ​​continuous improvement. It is always possible to do things better and adapt more precisely to the needs and expectations of the client, which, moreover, are dynamic.

2. Application

Said continuous improvement program can be applied in the field of hygiene and safety, it is clearly observed that in its postulates it includes that of Managing based on prevention and that of Strengthening the human factor. Being these, fundamental principles in the field of security given that Prevention is a fundamental pillar in Security Management. On the other hand, the empowerment of the Human factor is the engine that drives the growth of the culture of safety in workers, which is the sense of being of hygiene and safety.

It is clearly understood that the idea of ​​managing based on prevention as stated in the postulate of said program, gives an active life to the health and safety professional, since it contemplates that the idea of ​​doing things well from a principle is better than detect and correct. Since they minimize costs.

Obviously, the continuous improvement programs seek the highest productivity of the company and for the implementation of any program to be successful, they must complete the entire process, which are only the basic steps of the implementation. And it remains for granted that in this program hygiene and safety through Prevention are a fundamental part of its implementation and success.

3. Reengineering

What does "Reengineering" mean? Let's start by defining it from a simple point of view. Engineering is «The application of scientific knowledge to the invention, improvement and use of industrial technique….The coherent function that a group of experts contributes to the creative process of a technical achievement ". In short, it is the way in which man develops techniques to make things easier, so that any person can, following the same procedures, repeat the action with the same results. Reengineering then is, the review of those processes, in order to make them much more effective.

Reengineering is a new approach that analyzes and modifies the basic work processes in the business. In reality, reengineering prospects can be very attractive for business people, as it will allow them to fully apply all their knowledge in their companies, with the purpose (as we said before) of making them more effective: faster, more, higher quality, lower costs, higher profits.

Like all new activities, it has received a variety of names, including modernization, transformation and restructuring. However, regardless of the name, the goal is to increase the ability to compete in the market by reducing costs. This objective is constant and applies equally to the production of goods or the provision of services.

The recent emergence of reengineering efforts is not based on the invention of new management techniques. For decades, industrial engineering, time and motion studies, administrative economics, operations research, and systems analysis have been related to business processes.

Some progressive companies have seen that their response to the challenge of competition must go beyond reducing budgets: They have understood that changes must be efficient and that they must not only decrease costs, but also improve quality. The term reengineering is derived from the practice of developing information systems, so that the company can feed back on what is happening in the market, in the minds of its consumers and even within the company itself. From this it follows that the best way to use computers is to use them to facilitate new and better business processes, the faster and more fluid handling of information, rather than using them to automate old processes. To reengineer, you need to start from scratch.Not trying to rearrange the old way of doing things, but starting from scratch learning from that old way of doing things.

In its current development, reengineering, to be effective, involves a wide scope and its implementation requires a lot of skill. Business processes cross organizational lines, and changing one process can affect others. Reengineering requires experts in personnel work, engineering, economics, marketing, technologies of different kinds and in fact in the specific work to be carried out.

Application

If we say that reengineering reviews the processes in order to make them more effective; from that moment the human resource is linked to it, since it would be impossible to produce something if the human resource did not exist. Therefore, at the time you decide to apply Reengineering in a business, an exhaustive review of the process must be made, since it, like many improvement programs, seeks quality and reduces production costs.

Therefore Reengineering must become a fundamental part of the new LA Safety and Hygiene process, since if they were not met in the revised process, the costs they would generate would be opposite to what was expected and therefore the sense of being of the company. Reengineering, would not pay off.

4. Sustainable Development

Production - Ecological System Relationship

In the first place, the so limited thought of the production of goods and services has brought harmful consequences for humanity, one of them has been the environmental pollution generated by many industries worldwide, by not applying waste control systems in their productive processes, which does not contribute to the well-being of the Ecological Systems of the Nations.

As specified above, industrial activities invariably involve the transformation of raw materials or semi-finished or processed products, but this transformation is never total, generating waste, in the form of energy or matter, which if not recovered or reused becomes pollutants likely to cause damage to nature, altering the abundance and types of living species. On the other hand, industrial companies subjected to enormous pressure by the market, prices and regulations, tend to maximize their production, sales and profits, causes for which programs for minimizing the environmental damage derived are often not developed. of its activities and its production.

Then it is defined as follows

Sustainable Development: Sustainable development is a North American position that affirms that such development is the process of economic growth in which technology, the exploitation of resources and the social and political organization satisfy the needs of the present without compromising those of future generations.. For its part in Europe, the same concept is taken for sustainable development, which is considered as «a modern position in the face of environmental problems that affirms that organizations must be part of activities that can be sustained over a long term but are renewed in a timely manner. automatic ”, that is, despite the fact that both terms are explained in different words, they converge on the same point: the care, protection and sustainability of the environment.

Sustainable Development (Sustainable) - Production and Ecological System Relationship.

Sustainable or sustainable development as an indicator of economic growth can only be achieved if the environment is protected (Ecological System). Within sustainable development there are three environmental principles which are:

Without economic growth there is no solution to the environmental problem.

The environmental problem must not create turbulent zones in international trade

It is important to develop a common environmental policy between developed and developing countries.

In this way, sustainable development as an application of economic science solves the problem of limited resources against unlimited needs, through the application of technology to achieve production optimization.

This development can also be presented as a triangle whose vertices - economic growth, equity and the quality of the environment - are in a dynamic equilibrium. Therefore, a fundamental condition of sustainable development is the harmonization of economic policies, social policies and environmental policies. Managing this type of development is seen as an opportunity for business progress, where the production of goods and services is economically profitable, technologically feasible, environmentally friendly and socially convenient.

By taking into account ecological systems, sustainable development or sustainable development in the productive processes of companies, they will greatly benefit by obtaining comparative and competitive advantages that will differentiate, enhance and project them nationally and internationally.

Application

Industrial hygiene gains strength in the application of this program since within the nature of hygiene is the part of environmental sanitation that is fundamental for the development of the Sustainable Development program, it is worth mentioning that the hygiene professional and security, is an individual capable of coordinating, planning and executing actions aimed at the protection of the worker's property and the environment, apart from considering the protection of the environment a constitutional duty, it is convenient to remember the following:

Chapter IX On Environmental Rights

Article 127. “It is a right and a duty of each generation to protect and maintain the environment for the benefit of itself and the future world. Everyone has the right individually and collectively to enjoy a life and a safe, healthy and ecologically balanced environment. The State will protect the environment, biological and genetic diversity, ecological processes, national parks and natural monuments and other areas of special ecological importance. The genome of living beings cannot be patented, and the law that refers to bioethical principles will regulate the matter. It is a fundamental duty of the State, with the active participation of society, to guarantee that the population develops in an environment free of contamination, where the air, water, soil, climate, ozone layer, living species,be especially protected, in accordance with the law. ”

Note then, the active participation of the hygiene professional in compliance with this constitutional principle that is part of the implementation of the Sustainable Development program.

5. Benchmarking

The timeline presented here is that of the Xerox Corporation. Xerox was fortunate to discover and apply benchmarking early in its campaign to combat competition. Xerox's experience shows the need and promise of benchmarking.

In 1979 Xerox started a process called competitive benchmarking. Benchmarking first started with Xerox's industrial operations to examine its unit production costs. Comparisons of selected products were made and comparisons were made of competitors' capacity and operating characteristics of copy machines and their mechanical components were disassembled for analysis. These early stages of benchmarking were known as comparisons of quality and product characteristics.

The benchmarking was formalized with the analysis of the copiers produced by Fuji - Xerox, the Japanese affiliate of Xerox, and later other machines made in Japan. It was identified that the competitors sold the machines at the same price that Xerox had a hard time producing them, so the production style was changed in the USA to adopt the benchmark goals set externally to boost its business plans. Due to the great success of identifying competitors' new processes, new manufacturing components, and production costs, senior management ordered benchmarking to be used in all business units, and in 1983 the CEO ordered the priority of achieving leadership through quality and benchmarking was contemplated, along with employee participation and the quality process,as fundamental to achieve quality in all products and processes.

Before 1981, most industrial operations made comparisons with internal operations, benchmarking changed this, as the importance of seeing competing processes and products began to be seen, as well as considering other activities than production, such as sales, after sale service, etc. as parts or processes capable of being subjected to a benchmarking study. Although during this benchmarking stage it helped companies to improve their processes by studying the competition, it did not represent the final stage of the evolution of benchmarking, but it was later understood that the comparison with the competition apart from being difficult, due to the Difficulty in obtaining and sharing information, it would only help us to match them, but never to overcome them and be more competitive.It was for the above reason that a new way of doing benchmarking was sought, which would allow us to be superior, so it was recognized that benchmarking represents discovering best practices wherever they exist.

Benchmarking definition:

As mentioned before, there are several authors who have studied the subject, and in the same way, several definitions of what benchmarking is have been presented. Below are some definitions.

Formal definition.

It was derived from the experience and successes of the first days of applying benchmarking techniques to the manufacturing area:

Benchmarking is the continuous process of measuring products, services and practices against the toughest competitors or those companies recognized as leaders in the industry.

(David T. Kearns, CEO of Xerox Corporation).

This definition presents important aspects such as the concept of continuity, since benchmarking is not only a process that is done once and forgotten, but is a continuous and constant process. Another aspect is that of measurement, since it is involved in the benchmarking process, since you have to measure your own processes and those of other companies to be able to compare them. It can also be seen from this definition that benchmarking can be applied to all facets of the business. And finally the definition implies that benchmarking should be directed towards those companies and business functions within companies that are recognized as the best or as the leaders of the industry.

Webster's definition.

This definition is also informative and defines benchmarking as:

A surveyor's mark… of a predetermined position… and used as a reference point… a standard by which something can be measured or judged.

It serves to reinforce the idea that benchmark is a standard for comparing other objects or activities. It is a benchmark from which others will be measured.

Job definition.

It is the definition from the point of view of someone who has worked on the process for several years and has put it into practice many times, and is:

Benchmarking is the pursuit of industry best practices that lead to excellent performance. (Robert C. Camp).

This definition is understandable for business units and operations-oriented functions. The focus is on practices. Insist on practices and understanding of them before deriving a benchmarking metric. Benchmarking measurements are viewed as the result of understanding best practices, not as something you can quantify first and understand later. It focuses on achieving excellent performance, dantotsu, best of practice, best of class, best of its kind. It is a proactive definition since it is a positive and calculated effort to obtain the cooperation of the partners in benchmarking.

Benchmarking is the most credible justification for all operations. There is little discussion that can exist about the position of a manager if he has sought the best in the industry and has incorporated it into his plans and processes.

Among other definitions we have the one extracted from the book BENCHMARKING by Bengt Kallöf and Svante Östblom which is:

Benchmarking is a systematic and continuous process to compare our own efficiency in terms of productivity, quality and practices with those companies and organizations that represent excellence.

As we see in this definition, the fact that benchmarking is a continuous process is mentioned again. The term of comparison is also presented and therefore highlights the importance of measurement within the benchmark. These authors focus, apart from the business operations, on their quality and productivity, considering the value that these actions have against the costs of their performance, which represents quality, and the relationship between goods produced and the resources used for their production, which refers to productivity.

Benchmarking.- A systematic and continuous process to evaluate the products, services and work processes of organizations that are recognized as representing best practices, with the purpose of making organizational improvements. Michael J. Spendolini

Benchmarking has been presented as a tool for improving practices within business to become more competitive in an increasingly difficult market, however there are aspects and categories of benchmarking that it is important to review.

6. Aspects

Quality:

Among the aspects we have quality, which refers to the level of value created from the products for the client over the cost of producing them. Within this aspect, benchmarking can be very important to know the way in which other companies form and manage their quality systems, apart from being able to be used from a quality point of view in accordance with the quality perceived by customers, which it is determined by the relationship with the client, the satisfaction of the client and finally the comparisons with the competition. You can also see the aspect of quality according to what is called quality relative to standards, which refers to designing quality systems that ensure that the resulting quality will adhere to or meet predetermined specifications and standards,This can be done through reviewing the development and design process, production and distribution processes, and support processes such as accounting, finance, etc. Finally, within the quality aspect, you can see the reference to organizational development based on how much we focus on what we do, on the development of human resources, on their commitment and involvement, as well as on training.

Productivity:

Productivity benchmarking is the pursuit of excellence in the areas that control input resources, and productivity can be expressed by the volume of production and the consumption of resources which can be costs or capital.

Weather:

The study of time, as well as quality, symbolizes the direction of industrial development in recent years. Faster flows in sales, administration, production and distribution have received increased attention as a potential factor in improving productivity and competition. The development of time-focused programs have demonstrated a spectacular ability to cut delivery times.

Application

Starting from the principle of quality, which is the pillar of benchmarking, we find once again the security involved in it. Since within it, the Quality relative to Standards is included, which in our environment are closely linked to hygiene, safety and the environment, today companies seek to be certified in order to be more competitive in the market. national or international.

The standards that COVENIN, ISO or others seek to comply with are closely linked to what is safety and the Environment, of which the Hygiene and Safety professional is called to be in compliance with their development. It is therefore clear that once again Hygiene, Safety and care of the environment are a fundamental part in the implementation of continuous improvement systems.

7. Empowerment

Empowerment means delegating and trusting all the people in the organization and giving them the feeling that they own their own work, forgetting the pyramidal, impersonal structures and where decision-making was only done at the highest levels of the organization.

Thus, the old pyramid hierarchy is replaced by self-directed teams, where information is shared with everyone and people have the opportunity and responsibility to do their best by getting more motivated and committed people.

Within this definition, the concept of delegation becomes vitally important. It is based on trust, respect and tolerance to failure and understanding that the process involves training, communication and clarity that is the only way to achieve the desired objectives. It is important to differentiate delegating with "not caring" since the delegation process requires:

• Evaluate the competencies of the candidate Define responsibility Delegation authority Define performance objectives Training and development Provide information and knowledge Provide feedback Recognition

5. Basis of Empowerment Implementation

To implement the Empowerment system in a company it is necessary for there to be a change in the work culture, and for this it is necessary to learn to work as a team. Cynthia D. Scott and Dennis T. Jaffe propose to us in their book «Empowerment: How to Give Power and Authority to Your Work Team, measures to create a work team.

a) Creation of the Work Team

The teamwork approach is not new. Quality circles, for example, have long existed as a sample of this methodology. However, they do not take this as a philosophy and it is a philosophy in action that must become, that permeates the work culture and not an unusual or unusual resource.

By channeling energies to a common goal, you get things done that can't be done individually, and this is called synergism.

Synergism implies that the simultaneous actions of separate entities that together have a total effect greater than the sum of their individual effects. And this truly exists when all areas of the business are directed towards the same goal. This is undoubtedly the challenge that administrators are addressing today.

It is very important for managers to consider the energy that workers have so that they can channel them on the best path. Of the four types of energy that exist, physical, mental, emotional and spirit, it is this last one that you should focus on the most, because it is the one that allows people to encourage each other. However this does not mean that the others should be neglected.

The challenge of creating a team of high efficiency or performance and not a group of individuals that perform a lot involves two aspects: starting to think as higher-level agents without ever forgetting what it is like to be at the lowest levels, and starting to think more about team driving management terms.

An investigation conducted by Wilson identified eight attributes normally present in high-efficiency equipment:

1. Participatory leadership: creates interdependence by empowering, liberating and serving others Shared responsibility: establishes an environment in which all team members feel as responsible as the manager for the efficiency of the work unit Community of purpose: to have a sense of common purpose as to why the team existed and its role Good communication: creates a climate of trust and open and frank communication Looks at the future: to see change as a unit of growth Concentration on Task: Results-focused meetings are held Creative talents: Individual talents and creativity are at the service of the job Quick response: Identifying and exploiting opportunities.Establishing a high-efficiency team involves a development process and on their way to achieving it they go through three stages:

+ Phase 1. Recruitment of individuals. In this phase, teams tend to focus on the individual, to have individual rather than group objectives, not to share responsibilities, to avoid changes and not to face conflict.

+ Phase 2. Groups. Members develop a group identity, define their roles, clarify their purpose, and set standards for working together.

+ Phase 3. Team. Teams focus on purpose, members not only understand it but are committed to it and use it to guide actions and decisions.

Not all teams go through these phases in the same way, some differ in the time it takes to go from one phase to the next, and others change certain characteristics of each phase.

The manager's role in this regard is to identify those attributes that are helping his team to be more efficient and those that prevent it.

In a highly efficient team, the manager is one of its members, who participates with the rest of the employees. This does not imply that the work unit works like a democracy or that the manager is not responsible for what happens. Instead it indicates that better results will be obtained by leading and not leading in the traditional sense of the word.

An important mandate for managers is to help employees grow and they are considered the most positively influential.

There are three stages of employee growth. In the first it is considered dependent, they seek, observe and need direction. The manager's role is to say: give specific directions; set small goals; and provide information on both positive and negative results. The second stage is when the employee masters his task, he no longer depends on the manager in what they do, but they need him to influence their use of energy and the expected level of performance. The role of the manager at this stage is to assign them greater responsibility, more freedom, ask them for more power and suggestions, jointly set the objectives, and make the information of the results flow in two directions.

Many managers when they reach this stage believe that they have finished, however creating a highly efficient team requires one more step, a third stage, to make people interdependent. And the role of the manager becomes that of a collaborator, where he must help and advise his employees, request that they inform him of results, establish parameters, receive contributions regarding the way to carry out immediate tasks and give more responsibility.

Leadership is essential to get employees through the independent stage and into the interdependent wing, and to do this, managers need to rethink the traditional way of managing.

To create and lead a highly efficient team, the participatory leadership approach works best, with two-way communication and influence-based management to ensure commitment.

Effective leaders tend to empower, liberate, and serve their people. The idea of ​​authorizing aims to distribute responsibilities, to convey the importance of each team member and to allow each participant to be an equal member of the team. Liberation involves the use of talents, ideas, perceptions and capacities, both creative and problem-solving that people have. Serving involves placing yourself in the role of contributing to the growth of others.

Team members must work in harmony, help each other, recognize and complement each other's strengths and weaknesses, and share the conviction that they are mutually responsible.

One of the most important ways to promote shared responsibility is to exchange information and establish a climate that fosters it. Another way to encourage accountability is to give rewards when it occurs; and another is to promote shared responsibility, which consists of informing everyone about the group's overall task and how each part fits into the whole.

Teams with a high degree of shared responsibility have primary areas of responsibility, but members also take on other roles. They can help each other acquire new techniques, and members benefit from both group and individual accomplishments.

A key requirement of a super-efficient team is that all members share the same purpose. The purpose is a consciously chosen and clearly articulated orientation that uses the talents and abilities of your team, contributes to the organization and leads team members towards a sense of fulfillment.

Application

In the implementation of any management system, it is necessary to prepare the organization for a change, since it is sometimes difficult, since organizations are often resistant to change.

If within the principles of Empowerment, we find that one of them is the delegation of functions, just as everyone within the organization must be in constant continuous improvement to be more competitive; It is logical that Prevention, Hygiene and Safety interfere within any production cycle and must be the object of study and relevance.

At the same time it is inferred that the Empowerment seeks to involve all the members of the organization in order to create efficient teams and / or work groups that lead to collective satisfaction within the organization.

That is why the training that the Department of Industrial Hygiene and Safety is a fundamental part of in the fulfillment and development of the Empowerment program, being once again the Hygiene and Safety professional fully linked to the development of said program.

8. Total productive maintenance

Origin of the TPM

In today's world for a company to be able to survive must be competitive and can only be competitive if it meets these three conditions:

1. Provide a product of optimal conformity: remember that now in the jargon of ISO standards there is no longer talk of quality but of conformity

2. Have competitive costs: good management and effective production systems can help achieve this goal.

3. Make deliveries on time: the JIT, Just in Time or just in time concepts apply here.

When the different quality systems were born in one way or another, each and every one focused their attention on one or more of the so-called "5Ms":

1. Labor

2. Environment

3. Raw Material

4. Methods

5. Machines

However, the West never concentrated on the last of the five "Ms", the machines; Rather, they forgot about this aspect and concentrated on the other 4, which never allowed their systems to reach their full potential. This is where a new method that takes into account the "5 M" comes into the picture and offers to maximize the effectiveness of the systems, eliminating losses, thus the TPM was born, whose initials in Spanish mean Total Productive Maintenance.

TPM Mission

The mission of every company is to obtain an economic performance, however, the mission of the TPM is to achieve that the company obtain an INCREASING economic performance in a pleasant environment as a product of the interaction of the personnel with the systems, equipment and tools as illustrated in figure 1.

TPM objective

"Maximize the total effectiveness of production systems by eliminating their losses through the participation of all employees in small groups of voluntary activities."

TPM definition

It is a system that guarantees the effectiveness of production systems (5 M) whose goal is to have zero losses at the level of all departments with the participation of all staff in small groups.

8.- Pillars

To have a better perspective of the meaning of the TPM, it must be understood that it is based on 8 pillars (see figure 4).

As Figure 4 shows, the TPM is based on 8 pillars that in turn are based on people.

Application

Safety, Hygiene and Environment 8th Pillar of the Total Productive Maintenance program, which aims to "Create and maintain a system that guarantees a workplace environment without accidents and without contamination"

Here the important thing is to seek that the work environment is comfortable and safe, many times it happens that the contamination in the work environment is a product of the equipment malfunction, as well as many of the accidents are caused by the bad distribution of the equipment and tools in the work area.

This program makes clear and punctual mention of the importance of hygiene and safety within any work environment and therefore the validity and need for a professional in the area.

9. The Japanese 5S

What are 5S?

The Organization, Order and Cleaning operations were carried out by Japanese companies, including Toyota, under the name of 5S. They have been applied in various countries with remarkable success. The 5S are the initials of five Japanese words that name each of the five phases that make up the methodology:

SEIRI - ORGANIZATION

It consists of identifying and separating the necessary materials from the unnecessary ones and getting rid of the latter.

SEITON - ORDER

It consists of establishing the way in which the necessary materials should be located and identified, so that it is easy and quick to find, use and replace them.

SIX - CLEANING

It consists of identifying and eliminating the sources of dirt, ensuring that all the media are always in perfect health.

SEIKETSU - VISUAL CONTROL

It consists of easily distinguishing a normal situation from an abnormal one, by means of simple rules that are visible to all.

SHITSUKE - HOLD

Sustaining consists of establishing a new "status quo" and a new series of norms or standards in the organization of the work area.

2. Who are the 5S for?

For any type of organization, whether industrial or service, you want to start the path of continuous improvement. The 5S are universal, they can be applied in all kinds of companies and organizations, both in workshops and offices, even those that apparently are sufficiently tidy and clean.

"You can always avoid inefficiencies, avoid displacement, and eliminate waste of time and space."

What's your objective?

Improve and maintain the conditions of organization, order and cleanliness in the workplace. It is not a mere question of aesthetics. It is about improving working conditions, safety, the work environment, staff motivation and efficiency and, consequently, the quality, productivity and competitiveness of the organization.

Application

The 5S continuous improvement program is one of the most popular and applied improvement programs in western companies, it has been developed in many Latin American companies giving excellent results. It is worth mentioning that now in these times many of the professionals in its implementation call it the 6S, to which is added a sixth 6 of SEQURITY (security), understanding that the influence of Security on the implementation of Continuous improvement programs is of great relevance.

Order (SEITON) and cleanliness (SEIZO) are already the main part of the foundations of the 5S, and they are part of security within the industry, but now with the addition of a fifth Security, the importance and validity of the same within the continuous improvement programs.

10. Conclusion