5S or how to organize your workplace

Seiri, Seiton, Seiso, Seiketsu, Shitsuke. Do you know what these 5 incomprehensible Japanese words mean? Do not know? I will try to explain.

But first, a little history. In the 50s of the last century, Japan had not very sweet, the country was in a severe crisis: separated from the mainland, without special resources and with many other problems. But ... the Japanese are great. They gathered, studied a lot and worked a lot. They adopted all the best technologies, modernized and improved them. The only salvation of Japan at that moment was to become much more efficient than the rest of the world.

And the Japanese did it. They began to work very, very effectively. And the way they work is very neat, like bricks, folded into the system. The work system of the Japanese turned out to be slim, but alive, and, very importantly, constantly improving.
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Wikipdia knows something about lean manufacturing , Toyota and their production system , Kaizen and Masaaki Imai .

So this system is all created in order to minimize and eliminate as much as possible all costs. And to make the process just super effective.

And one of the smallest, but very important building blocks of this system was the 5S methodology, a methodology for the effective organization of the workplace. It consists in the application of 5 simple principles. Principles that save time and effort and work efficiently.

What are these principles?

1. Seiri (Sort)

Select all the programs, documents, tools, materials and other things that you use or that help you in your work. Else either erase or discard, or remove it somewhere far away. Leave only what you really need. Be honest and objective. If in doubt, remove the item in the back box, you will need - you will get it.

2. Seiton (Arrange)

Tools and documents that you consider important, arrange for convenient and easily accessible places. The places that best fit your workflow. Place your order on your desktop and computer. Configure the services you use. Spread reference books and books that are regularly addressed on the shelves. Make your work place comfortable.

It is important that there is a place for everything and everything in its place.

The Japanese (and now almost all modern) factories use the so-called shadow method - where the specific tool should lie, the contour of this tool is drawn. This is done in order to be immediately visible if there is no tool or it does not lie in its place. The fact that it is not necessary to check everything on the spot every time and look for what is missing, saves a lot of time.

3. Seiso (Get Out)

Systematic cleaning is a must-have. Spend a little time at the end of your day, or when you finish working, cleaning. Take out the trash, put everything in its place. Make it so pleasant to start working again the next morning. The key point is regularity. It is important that cleaning be part of your work day, and not be done from time to time when “too much mess”.

4. Seiketsu (Standardize)

Standardize your workflow wherever possible. If there are regularly repeated actions, describe them, think over all the points and do not spend more time thinking about it when you need to do this action again. Try to develop yourself the best lines of conduct. Having on hand ready-made action algorithms, you will save a huge pile of time. And stop losing sight of important points.

5. Shitsuke (Maintain)

After your work is more or less standardized, there is order on the table and on the whole in the workplace, there is nothing superfluous and everything is in its place - do not stop! All this is very important to maintain and gradually improve.

Well read?

Too simple and obvious? Look at the table around you and at your desktop.

I am very happy if everything is all right with you. If not, try today to remove the excess from the table, tidy up, put everything in its place, describe (at least in your head) how your working day is going. And at least a couple of weeks to try to comply with these impossibly obvious principles.