We hear from many of our customers that they have carried out 5S work but that it does not last. Immediately afterward comes the question, "How will you do this?" We have met many managers, employers, and engineers who express this problem in another way. In order to answer the question and to help you make your work a little more lasting, the question needs to be taken as a problem and its root cause examined. If we list the reasons that lie behind 5S work which does not last—this will not seem very unfamiliar to you—we often come to understand a mistake that is made without being aware of it.
The problems we encounter many times are these;
- Claiming that 5S work is production's job, saying that the work must be done by production and even that this work is already their duty. Insisting on this, and even being coercive.
- Allowing certain practices that undermine 5S work, with the statement "let us fix the other places first; we will look here last," or with the remark "let this place be excluded".
- Trying to carry out 5S work without learning Kaizen, problem-solving techniques, A3, and similar techniques, and trying to solve problems by associating them with people's skill instead of solving them with Kaizen.
- A particular department of the company carrying out 5S work on its own, without the support of management
- Concern that the materials revealed by 5S will be thrown away
- Employees losing their jobs as a result of 5S improvement
- Carrying out 5S work through individual efforts, and not encouraging teamwork.
- Expecting problems that have gone on for years to be solved in a short time, and putting forward chronic problems as the reason while claiming that the work has fallen short
- People looking from a narrow frame and trying to make improvements only in their own work
- Not allocating resources,
- Preserving the traditional way of working, and making no change in the basic processes.
A fairly long series of causes could of course be written; what I have mentioned here are some of them. As a system, 5S is quite simple, and it contains techniques you can easily learn with a short search on the internet. When you begin to apply it on your own, this simplicity is the first thing you learn. What is difficult? Well! I can almost hear you say that. What is really difficult? Although 5S and Kaizen work are very easy as systems, it is difficult to get all the employees of the business to begin applying them in a similar way. I can comfortably say that this is the real difficulty.
It is necessary to accept that not all employees can learn at the same level and to act accordingly, not to make the mistakes written above, and, if you have made them, to carry out additional practices in order to make up for them. Remember that mistakes which have been made do not pass and go away at once; they leave a trace behind. You need to accept that employees are affected by this trace. You should make an effort to erase these traces. We often say, and we often hear, that people's habits are hard to change. We perceive this statement as if it were a statement made for others, excluding "OURSELVES". Yet we need to remember that the way to change someone else is to change ourselves. There is no other way. As long as the reactions we give to every kind of communication signal coming from employees remain the same, it is not very appropriate behavior to expect them to be affected by what we say and to change. For that reason, changing the reactions we give them is the first thing we must do.
