MEC E 513

Production and Operations Management

Technical Note 5
Job Design and Work Measurement

Lecture 04a: 28 September 2006

John Doucette
Dept. of Mechanical Engineering
University of Alberta
http://www.mece.ualberta.ca/~doucette/mece513/
 MEC E 513 – Production and Operations Management

Introduction to Job Design

• Job design is the function of specifying work activities in
an organizational setting.
– meet the requirements of the organization and its technology
– satisfy the worker’s personal and individual requirements

Who? What? Where? When? Why? How?

Mental and Geographical Time of day, Organizational
Tasks to be Method of
physical location of sequence in rationale for
performed Performance
consideration organization the workflow the job
of workforce & work areas or process

Job Structure

John Doucette
2 Dept. of Mechanical Engineering
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 MEC E 513 – Production and Operations Management

Behavioural Considerations in Work Design

• Focus on the interaction between technology and the
work group
– Task and skill variety
• an optimal variety of is needed
• too much variety can be frustrating and inefficient for training
• too little can lead boredom and fatigue
– Feedback
• some means for informing employees quickly when they have
achieved their targets
– Task identity
• avoid overlapping between tasks
– Task autonomy
• employees should be able to have some control over their work area

John Doucette
3 Dept. of Mechanical Engineering
Lecture 04a TN5: 28 September 2006
 MEC E 513 – Production and Operations Management

Physical Considerations in Work Design

• Work physiology sets work-rest cycles according to the
energy expended in various parts of the job.
– the harder the work, the more the need for rest periods

• Ergonomics describes the study of the physical

arrangement of the work space together with tools used to
perform a task.
– fit the work to the body rather than forcing the body to conform to
the work.

John Doucette
4 Dept. of Mechanical Engineering
Lecture 04a TN5: 28 September 2006
 MEC E 513 – Production and Operations Management

Work Study Methods

production
4 main activities process
to focus on

worker
worker at a Job interacting
fixed with other
Design
workplace workers

worker
interacting
with equipment
John Doucette
5 Dept. of Mechanical Engineering
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 MEC E 513 – Production and Operations Management

Work Measurement
• Work measurement is a process of analyzing jobs for the
purpose of setting time standards

• Time study
– Timing all tasks required for the job

• Work sampling
– Random sampling of a worker’s activities

John Doucette
6 Dept. of Mechanical Engineering
Lecture 04a TN5: 28 September 2006
 MEC E 513 – Production and Operations Management

Time Study
• The normal time (NT) is the how long it should take an
ordinary worker to complete the task:

NT = UT x PR

• UT = observed performance time per unit

• PR = performance rating, which is a measure of how fast or efficient a
worker is relative to what is considered normal.

• Also: NT = TW x PR
# Units

• TW = total time worked

John Doucette
7 Dept. of Mechanical Engineering
Lecture 04a TN5: 28 September 2006
 MEC E 513 – Production and Operations Management

Time Study (2)

• The standard time (ST) is used to correct for potentially
unavoidable work delays:

ST = NT x (1 + allowances)

• Allowances = estimated percentage of time due to the delay

• Also: ST = ___NT___
1 – allowances

• The second equation is actually better

John Doucette
8 Dept. of Mechanical Engineering
Lecture 04a TN5: 28 September 2006
 MEC E 513 – Production and Operations Management

Time Study In-Class Example

• You want to determine the standard time for a job. The
employee selected for the time study has produced 20
units of product in an 8 hour day. Your observations made
the employee nervous and you estimate that the
employee worked about 10 percent faster than what is a
normal pace for the job. Allowances for the job represent
25 percent of the normal time.

• What are the normal and standard times for this job?

John Doucette
9 Dept. of Mechanical Engineering
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 MEC E 513 – Production and Operations Management

Work Sampling
• Use inferences to make statements about work activity
based on a random sampling of the activity

• Work sampling has three primary applications

– Ratio Delays
• Determine activity-time percentage for workers or equipment

– Performance Measurement
• Relates work time to output (performance index)

– Time Standards
• How long does/should it take to perform each task?

John Doucette
10 Dept. of Mechanical Engineering
Lecture 04a TN5: 28 September 2006
 MEC E 513 – Production and Operations Management

Work Sampling Procedure

1. Identify the specific activity or activities that are the main
purpose of the study.

2. Estimate the proportion of time of the activity of interest to

the total time.

3. State the desired accuracy.

4. Determine the specific times when each observations is

to be made.

5. At two or three intervals during the study period,

recomputed the required sample size by using the data
collected thus far. Adjust the number of observations if
appropriate.
John Doucette
11 Dept. of Mechanical Engineering
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 MEC E 513 – Production and Operations Management

Work Sampling Advantages

• Several work sampling studies may be conducted
simultaneously
• The observer usually need not be a trained analyst
• No timing devices are required
• Work of a long cycle time may be studied with fewer
observer hours
• Study duration is longer, so minimizes effects of short-
period variations
• The study may be temporarily delayed at any time with
little effect
• Because work sampling needs only instantaneous
observations, the operator has less chance to influence
the findings by changing work method

John Doucette
12 Dept. of Mechanical Engineering
Lecture 04a TN5: 28 September 2006
 MEC E 513 – Production and Operations Management

Work Sampling Example

• A hospital wants to determine how much of its nurses’
time is spent on classic nursing duties (rather than other
things like paperwork, etc.). We estimate that it’s probably
somewhere around 60% but want to use work sampling
over a period of 10 days (on shifts that run from 7:00 AM
to 3:00 PM) to determine it within an error of 3%.

John Doucette
13 Dept. of Mechanical Engineering
Lecture 04a TN5: 28 September 2006
 MEC E 513 – Production and Operations Management

Work Sampling Example (2)

• The first step is to look on table TN5.11 in your text book
and determine how many observations we want.

John Doucette
14 Dept. of Mechanical Engineering
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 MEC E 513 – Production and Operations Management

Work Sampling Example (3)

• Since we want 1 067 observations in total, then we need
106.7 ≈ 107 per day.

• Next, we assign random numbers to the eligible times:

Time Random Numbers

7:00 – 7:59 AM 100-159
8:00 – 8:59 AM 200-259
9:00 – 9:59 AM 300-359
10:00 – 10:59 AM 400-459
11:00 – 11:59 AM 500-559
12:00 – 12:59 PM 600-659
1:00 – 1:59 PM 700-759
2:00 – 2:59 PM 800-859

John Doucette
15 Dept. of Mechanical Engineering
Lecture 04a TN5: 28 September 2006
 MEC E 513 – Production and Operations Management

Work Sampling Example (4)

• Finally, pick random numbers and match them with the
times assigned to them. Using random numbers from the
table in Appendix B:
Number Time
569 -
831 2:31 PM
555 11:55 AM
470 -
848 2:48 PM
080 -
364 -
057 -
267 -
426 10:26 AM
954 -
… …
John Doucette
16 Dept. of Mechanical Engineering
Lecture 04a TN5: 28 September 2006
 MEC E 513 – Production and Operations Management

Work Sampling In-Class Problem

• Your best guess is that one particular task of a complex
operation takes approximately 5% of the operation’s total
time. However, you’re not sure, and decide to establish a
more accurate time standard using work sampling. You
have someone available from 8:00 AM to 12:00 noon for
the next 12 weeks (i.e., 60 working days). You want an
absolute error of no more than 2.5%.
– Calculate the number of observations per day.
– Determine the sampling schedule for the first day.

John Doucette
17 Dept. of Mechanical Engineering
Lecture 04a TN5: 28 September 2006
 MEC E 513 – Production and Operations Management

Financial Compensation and Incentive Plans

• Basic Compensation Systems
– Hourly pay
– Salary
– Piece rate
– Commission

• Individual and small-group incentive plans

– Output measures
– Quality measures
– Pay for knowledge
• Organization-wide incentive plans
– Profit-sharing
– Gain-sharing

John Doucette
18 Dept. of Mechanical Engineering
Lecture 04a TN5: 28 September 2006