Housekeeping Starts in My Garage

I walked into my garage the other day looking for a tool I desperately needed.  I couldn’t find it.

Contrary to what people who know me might suggest, I’m not an organizing fanatic who outlines each tool in its hanging place on the wall of my workshop.  In the course of daily business I do organize quite a bit (OK maybe MORE than just a bit), but at home in my shop I utilize a globally recognized and intricate standard known as ”The Pile” method.   Who gets credit for this method I’m not sure, though based on its efficiency, I would guess Gomer Pyle USMC; if you are younger than 40, check YouTube and you’ll understand.

It used to be I knew where every pile was and what was in each pile.  Unfortunately over the years, my number of piles and projects-in-progress (I’m also a “plate spinner” but we’ll leave that for another post) have grown exponentially and I remember less of just exactly what comprises each of those piles.

My workbench is the Mother Of All Piles (M.O.A.P.), an eclectic mixture of garden materials, hand tools for building fine furniture, a gopher trap or two, half a dozen pieces of exotic hardwood, maybe an interesting article clipped from an obscure technical magazine…you get the picture.  Getting back to my issue, time, age and events conspired against me and, against all powers of reason, I could not find sought after tool.

If you’ve made it this far, you may be asking yourself, “OK. (yawn) How does this apply to FME?”  In another post I’ve discussed the meaning of FME and the basic conceptual approach.  What I want to touch upon here is how FME is interrelated with other disciplines, in this case, housekeeping. 

So that I did not misplace a tool, I could hire a housekeeping-type person to clean and organize my workshop, but I wouldn’t do it.  Sure I could use the help, but it’s my little shop and it doesn’t affect anyone else.  Now put dozens of other people in this same space without each of us cleaning up after ourselves…chaos!  What happens when one person leaves an M.O.A.P. of rags, tools, containers, their safety harness, components, bolts, etc. in the work area?  How easy is it to lose something inadvertently?  How simple is it to accidentally kick something, sending it flying into oblivion?  Where is oblivion anyway?

What if it’s just a little ole’ bolt laying on the deck next to my tool bucket?  From projects I’ve worked, it is pretty simple math to see that if housekeeping awareness was a supported priority, some of the lost productivity surrounding tracking objects so that they do not become foreign material could be recaptured.  And if that bolt gets bumped into a machine opening?  Well that’s escalates my case to a whole another level. 

Does housekeeping eliminate foreign material issues?  No, but it’s a necesary base from which to start.  If it were better employed during FME we’d be more efficient and reduce object drops…and if used in my garage, I might not be whining about my misplaced tool.  What tool was it I needed anyway?  Talk about your lost productivity.

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