5S (Five S) Housekeeping, Methodology of 5S?

5S (Five S) Housekeeping

Japanese concept that lays the Foundation to create a Disciplined Mind, Which leads to Disciplined thoughts which leads to Disciplined Actions

• Actions which improve Safety, Quality, Delivery, Cost, Moral & Environment
• Exposes some of the most visible example of waste
• Establishes the framework & discipline required to pursue other improvements

1. Sort (Seiri): keeping only essential items. Everything else is sorted and discarded.
2. Set in Order (Seiton): Arrange the tools, equipment and parts in a orderly manner. 
3. Shine (Seisō): Systematic Cleaning and keeping the workplace clean as well as neat.
4. Standardize (Seiketsu): Standardize work practices and horizontal replication.
5. Sustain (Shitsuke): Refers to maintaining and reviewing standards. Once the previous 4S's have been established, they become the new way of operating.

Why  5S?

• Creates pleasant, safe & work-friendly environment
• Building up visual-workplace with standard work practices
• Develop discipline minds, discipline thoughts & disciplined actions of all employees
• Get everybody's involvement at every level
• Attitude transfer (My M/c to My Area to My Dept. to My Organization)
• Develop Kaizen minded people in the organization
• Reduce physical & psychological stress of employees
• Reduce the resistance to change
• The start of systematic waste elimination activities & foundation of visual factory
• Improve floor space utilization & improve service quality
• The foundation of continuous improvement

5S (generates) Disciplined Mind (generates) Disciplined thoughts (generates) disciplined actions

Moving forward with 5S

• Divide plant into zones (No, “No-mans’ land”)
• Appoint zonal champions
• Develop zonal teams under zonal champions
• Develop a steering committee

- Plant Head

- Zonal Champions

- 5S coordinator (Training, Awareness, Auditing, Promotions, competitions, CSR projects & coordination among zones)

Sort (Seiri)

Principle

• Stratification management
• Get rid of unwanted items, activities & thoughts
• Separate the necessary from the unnecessary
• Get rid of what you do not need

Methodology

• Mindset of people to reduce waste
• Red-tag (Companywide or Zone wise)
• Create a red-tag log and record
• Red tag auction as per the disposal policy
• Root cause analysis of all unwanted things
• Repeat Seiri event and red-tagging periodically
• After achieving “Zero Red-tags” prevent Seiri

“When in doubt, move it out”

Set in Order (Seiton)

Principle

• Determine addresses for material & equipment, put them in that place & keep them there
• Functional storage & search elimination
• Arrange necessary items in order

Methodology

• Identify wanted things from Seiri
• Create addresses as per the usage pattern
• Consider wastes (Transport, motion, etc.), safety & the ergonomic effects
• Achieve 30 seconds rule, Zero down time due to unavailability, less inventory

“A place for everything and everything is in place”

Shine (Seisō)

Principle

• Cleaning & identifying abnormalities, hard to access areas & eliminate all
• Visual observation
• Systematically clean & inspect the workplace

Methodology

• Develop cleaning schedules and clean accordingly
• Address source of contamination & abnormalities
• Reduced contamination and cleaning
• Further elimination of sources of contamination

“Do not clean, Keep it clean”

Standardize (Seiketsu)

Principle

• Determine the “best” work practices
• 5S standardization
• Visual management & SOPs

Methodology

• Repeat 1st 3S
• Identify best practices & Standardization
• Standardized Visual Management of the site
• Create platform for continuous improvement
• Wide scope in process & equipment standardization

“If you can’t see, you don’t know; and if you don’t know, you can’t control”

Sustain (Shitsuke)

Principle

• Sustain improvement & make further improvement
• Habit formation
• Schedule 5S audit
• Develop self-discipline

Methodology

• Get management commitment
• Get everyone involvement
• Gemba walk
• Establish 5S standards
• Reward & recognize individuals & teams

“Maintain the gain, forget the blame”