Operations Management: An Integrated Approach, 5th Edition

WORK MEASUREMENT

Work measurement

Determines how long it should take to do a job.

Standard time

The length of time it should take a qualified worker using appropriate process and tools to complete a specific job, allowing time for personal fatigue and unavoidable delays.

The third component in work system design, work measurement, is a way of determining how long it should take to do a job. Work measurement techniques are used to set a standard time for a specific job. The standard time is the time it should take a qualified operator, working at a sustainable pace and using the appropriate tools and process, to do the job. The standard time is the sustainable time it takes to do either a whole job or a portion or element of a job. In our restaurant example, the time needed to take the customer's order and communicate that information to the kitchen staff can be calculated as the standard time.

Why should a company set the standard time for a job? Companies use standard times for costing, evaluating, and planning.

Costing

When costing a product, a company includes labor in the total cost estimate. Instead of timing the labor to build single units, companies typically use a standard labor cost. To do this, they multiply the standard labor time by a given hourly labor cost to determine ...