Determination of standard times for process improvement: A case study

The companies are required to use proper methods to reduce their costs and increase productivity levels so that they can survive in the fast-changing competitive conditions of the existing business environment. Work study is one of those highly effective productivity improvement methods in labor dependent industries. Determination of standard times, which is one of the important steps of a work study, provides a critical input for process improvement activities within companies. This work is based on a project which included determination of standard times as one of the earliest steps of process improvement activities in a steel-pipe manufacturing company. In systems analysis phase which was performed as the first step, it was observed that long delays occurred on production lines and an evenly distribution of workload among workers was not achievable most of the times. In order to alleviate these problems, all labor-intensive jobs within the system were identified and depicted in process charts. Standard times of the processes were determined by using time study and work sampling techniques. Next, line balancing problems associated with uneven workloads were addressed using these standard times data and some solutions were obtained. All in all, the framework which provided promising results in this pilot study was recommended to be broadened to the entire manufacturing system of the company. Keywords: time study, work sampling, standard time, productivity.