Business owners normally look at the factory performance data which are prepared by the engineers. The primary KPIs they used to see, are line efficiency, machine productivity of the current running orders, production capacity, production cost etc.
Most of the shop floor performance matrix measured by industrial engineers are based on the garment standard time (SAM value). Whether it is line efficiency, individual employee efficiency, estimated garment cost, daily production target, production schedules etc.
Now the question is how are you estimating the SAM of your garments?
If you don’t have any software to define the SAM of operations you may be wrong in estimating standard minutes. Your SAM would be either less or high than the actual SAM. Normally, it has been seen that engineers who do not have training on work-study tools like time and motion study, calculate SAM based on their assumption. They set their assumption by observing few old operation bulletins made by ex-employees or by their colleagues.
Can you assume, what will happen if you calculate your performance matrixes with the wrong garment SAM?
See my explanations on the effects of the wrong SAM.
#1. Garment costing is done based on garment manufacturing cost (CM cost). CM cost is defined by multiplying SAM (work content) in a garment with an hourly rate of the labor. So, a loose SAM will give high manufacturing cost and very tight SAM give low manufacturing cost. Both cases are risky for the business. As you may lose your customer by quoting a high price for your products. On the other hand, you will not earn the potential profit in making the order if your product SAM is very tight.
#1. Garment costing is done based on garment manufacturing cost (CM cost). CM cost is defined by multiplying SAM (work content) in a garment with an hourly rate of the labor. So, a loose SAM will give high manufacturing cost and very tight SAM give low manufacturing cost. Both cases are risky for the business. As you may lose your customer by quoting a high price for your products. On the other hand, you will not earn the potential profit in making the order if your product SAM is very tight.
#2. Secondly, the line performance and operator performance would not present the true performance of the line or operator with the loose and tight SAM. Repeatedly presenting efficiency in a wrong value will set a wrong perception about the factory performance.
#3. Capacity planning is done based on the standard time. All planning may be in a mess if standard minutes are not set correctly.
#4. Incorrect incentive amount: If your company has an incentive plan based on individual efficiency then a wrong SAM is the most dangerous for a factory. Either an operator will not get fair incentive or factory will lose a lot of money in incentive.
No matter whether you own a SAM calculator or PMTS systems like GSD or Pro-SMV you can still make it right. Go to the floor, study the operators how they are working and record operation cycle time. Rate your operator. Using cycle time data recalculate SAM and compare it with your SAM set for that operation. Correct it in your operation bulletin.
No matter whether you own a SAM calculator or PMTS systems like GSD or Pro-SMV you can still make it right. Go to the floor, study the operators how they are working and record operation cycle time. Rate your operator. Using cycle time data recalculate SAM and compare it with your SAM set for that operation. Correct it in your operation bulletin.
Hope you find this post interesting.