LO2. Assess Own Work

Information Sheet 2.1: Safety and Environmental Aspects of Production Processes

Safety Standards and Precautions in Process Manufacturing

Process manufacturing is a production system that creates finished goods by combining various materials using a predetermined process or formula. It is frequently used in industries that produce bulk quantities of goods such as food and beverage, oil byproducts, gasoline, pharmaceuticals, chemicals, plastics, paper and roll goods. The basic types of production processes for these industries include individual projects, small batch production, bulk production, and continuous production.

Every manufacturing production process comes with its own set of safety concerns. To address all concerns, there are some important things to take into consideration:

Hazard Identification

The first step in addressing safety in the manufacturing process is to identify the hazards. This is best done during design of the equipment. The next opportunity to identify hazards is during equipment installation. And lastly, the least desirable time, is after the equipment is running production. Hazards can include exposed moving parts, pinch points, uneven surfaces, trip hazards, electrical exposures, hot surfaces, sharp edges or corners, environmental, fall hazards and more. Once hazards are identified, they can now be addressed.

Hazard Controls

The Countermeasure Ladder concept “forces” us to think critically about the hazard mitigation process. Too many issues are resolved at the training or audit level, when in-depth thinking would lead to a better resolution of the hazard. Every hazard identified should be addressed as high up the ladder as possible to ensure the most effective prevention actions have been determined and can be put into place.

Proper Guarding

Whenever a hazard cannot be eliminated, measures must be taken to safely protect the operator from the hazard. Proper guarding of equipment includes any barrier that prevents the operator from encountering moving parts that could cause harm or injury. Areas that require guarding include conveyors, turning rolls, chains and gears, belts and pulleys, presses and so on. It is important that the guard be installed in such a way as that it is not easily removable.

Environmental Hazards

The manufacturing process area must be accessed for biological, chemical and physical hazards. Biological hazards may be the result of waste or byproducts of the manufacturing process. Chemical hazards may be present because of certain chemicals used in the manufacturing process, or reactions of certain chemicals being blended during the manufacturing process. Examples of physical hazards are poor air quality, extreme noise, temperature, and radiation exposure. Once these hazards are assessed and rated, proper precautions must be taken to protect operators. Precautions may range from eliminating the hazard from the process to providing adequate operator PPE such as respirators, rated clothing and hearing protection.

Personal Protection Equipment (PPE)

After all reasonable precautions are taken for worker safety, the manufacturing process needs to be accessed for operator PPE. This may consist of hearing protection, eye protection, gloves suitable for the task, protective clothing and respirator needs. The PPE must be properly fitted and the operators need to be trained on proper use of the PPE to make sure it is effective and will provide the necessary protections.

Safety Training

Operators must be trained on how to safely use the equipment in the manufacturing process. Clear Safety procedures must be written and signed off by the operators. This ensures that they understand the training and agree to use the equipment as intended. Any gaps in the training process must be addressed immediately and again signed off by the operators.

Operator Ownership of Safety

The Operators MUST OWN THE SAFETY PROCESS. Management MUST SUPPORT THE SAFETY PROCESS. Top down safety processes rarely are effective because operators feel that they are forced to do things and their voice is never heard when they bring up issues. Statistics show that operators are the ones getting hurt in the manufacturing process making it crucial for them to be the owners of safety. Management must allow the operators to own safety while providing the resources needed by the operators.

Successfully managing safety in the manufacturing process improves profits, improves production efficiency and improves employee morale.

Information Sheet 2.2: Fault Identification and Reporting

Fault Identification and Reporting

Identify the problem

The first step in any fault diagnosis process is to identify the problem clearly and precisely. This means defining the symptoms, the expected performance, the scope, and the urgency of the issue. You should also gather relevant information, such as the system specifications, the operating conditions, the maintenance history, and the user feedback. This will help you to narrow down the possible causes and solutions.

Perform the diagnosis

The next step is to perform the diagnosis using appropriate methods and tools. Depending on the type and complexity of the problem, you may use visual inspection, testing, measurement, simulation, or troubleshooting techniques. You should follow a logical and systematic approach, such as the divide-and-conquer, top-down, or bottom-up methods, to isolate and verify the fault. You should also document your steps, results, and observations carefully and accurately.

Evaluate the options

Once you have identified the fault, you should evaluate the possible options for resolving it. This may involve comparing the costs, benefits, risks, and feasibility of different actions, such as repairing, replacing, calibrating, or upgrading the faulty component or system. You should also consider the impact of your decision on the overall performance, reliability, and safety of the instrumentation system.

Make the recommendations

Based on your evaluation, you should make the recommendations that best suit the needs and expectations of your client, manager, or colleague. You should explain your rationale, evidence, and assumptions clearly and convincingly. You should also provide alternative or contingency plans in case of unforeseen circumstances or changes in requirements. You should also specify the expected outcomes, time frames, and resources needed for implementing your recommendations.

Prepare the report

The final step is to prepare a comprehensive and professional report that summarizes your fault diagnosis process and recommendations. You should follow the format, style, and guidelines of your organization or industry. You should also use clear and concise language, diagrams, tables, charts, and references to support your claims and arguments. You should also proofread and edit your report for accuracy, clarity, and readability.

Share the feedback

The last but not least step is to share your feedback with your client, manager, or colleague. You should present your report in a timely and respectful manner, and be prepared to answer any questions or concerns they may have. You should also solicit their feedback on your work and performance, and use it to improve your skills and knowledge. You should also follow up on the implementation and outcomes of your recommendations, and document any lessons learned or best practices for future reference.

Information Sheet 2.3: Workplace Procedure in Documenting Completed Work

Workplace Procedure in Documenting Completed Work

Documentation includes any kind of record-keeping about an office environment or its employees. There are many types of documentation and formats for those types, but in its most basic form, documentation is simply taking records about things that happen in an office.

Documentation can be kept physically or digitally; you just need to make sure everything is well-organized. It’s possible to keep accurate physical records with files on employees and events in the workplace, as long as they’re protected and secure.

Storing documentation digitally is how most companies are choosing to keep their HR records, and there are plenty of tools out there to help you get that set up. Documentation also can be used to provide evidence or resources in a variety of important circumstances, such as:

Employee evaluations for promotions or terminations.
Compliance with government regulations.
Merger or acquisitions.
Financial or tax audits.
Research and development.
New management or ownership.
Company evaluations.

Benefits of documentation

There are three big benefits to documenting things that happen in the workplace. No matter what kinds of records you keep, you can benefit from them in these ways.

Show employees respect. When you document things at work, you’re showing employees and outsiders that you take these things seriously and you’re a professional business. It shows employees that you respect their work and you document everything fairly, both the good and the bad.

When sharing select records with people outside of the company, you’re proving that you’re a professional company, and you take the time to make sure everything is appropriately documented.

Create standardized processes. Documenting processes requires a level of standardization and organization, so by recording company practices, you’re creating a repeatable process. This can help with onboarding new hires, as well as helping current employees better understand how things are done.

Boost profitability. When you take the time to keep thorough records, it can help you save time and money in the long run.

For example, when you bring on a new employee, instead of having team members walk that new hire through all of the processes their job requires, having a pool of information and documentation can help the new hire get a head start and learn on their own.

Formal vs. Informal Documentation

It might be surprising to learn that almost anything can count as documentation, so it can be hard to define what formal documentation really is. One way to think about documentation is formal versus informal.

Formal. Formal documentation is all about standardized record keeping. Things like employee reviews, manager reviews, or other standardized documents count as formal documents.

Usually, there is a process for obtaining, recording, and keeping formal documents, so if you’re working on a document that follows HR or company guidelines, it’s probably part of formal documentation.

Informal. You might not realize it, but things like meeting notes, emails, and interoffice communication, or manager’s notes on employee performance count as documentation; they can just be considered informal documentation.

Both formal and informal documentation have their uses. Informal documentation is great for creating reminders of important ideas, events, and reviews that employees can later examine.

They’re useful for employee reviews, especially if managers have notes to look back on and gauge employee growth. Formal documents are usually used for more official purposes, like documenting specific processes within a company or creating a record for an employee.

How to properly maintain employee documentation

Keeping documentation is a good start, but making sure it’s properly maintained and done correctly is key to making your documentation a real tool for your workplace.

Unfortunately, documentation that isn’t done properly can cause issues later down the line or even prove to be useless.

One of the main responsibilities of an HR department is to keep clear, streamlined, and accurate records of employees, so appropriate documentation is important.

When it comes to documenting the employees at a company, there are a few guidelines and systems you need to follow. We’re going to give you a few tips to help you make sure you’re keeping accurate and proper documentation:

Document employee files. It’s important to keep certain documents on hand for all employees, like resumes, job applications, employment eligibility, disciplinary reports, performance reports, leave of absence letters, and emergency contacts.

Keeping basic documents like these can help you in the long run if you ever need to refer back to them for future hiring decisions or employment history.

Provide performance expectations. Often HR departments will need to document any issues with employee performance, but a key part of this is providing the performance expectations in the first place.

You need to document what’s expected of the employee before you can document any issues with their performance, so make sure you communicate performance requirements as soon as possible.

Contextualize events. One of the best things you can do when creating documents is to contextualize what you’re documenting.

Not everyone who reads the report will have the same knowledge as you or the people involved, so make sure you give some background on what you’re describing. List all of the people involved, any relevant events, and over-explain to be safe.

Don’t discriminate. This should be obvious, but it’s always good to be reminded to leave discriminatory statements out of records. Don’t make assumptions about employees or leave discriminatory statements in records.

For example, you don’t want to create a report about a sexual misconduct or sexual harassment case and note the sexual orientations of the employees involved.

Document after an employee leaves. Even if an employee leaves your company, you should keep their records on hand and document their exit.

Compile things like remaining paycheck info, resignation or termination letter, and exit interview in case issues come up in the future.

Aim for consistency. It can be hard to make every report the same, but try to be as consistent as possible. That includes things like facts you choose to include, the language you use, and how you talk about the employees in question.

Being consistent is a key part of accurate reporting.

Keep reports factual. Sometimes coworker or manager complaints, negative employee reviews, or other reports come up, and you need to document them. In these cases, it’s important only to record the facts and try to keep emotions or perceptions out of the official documents.

This applies to both negative and positive events that are recorded. Keeping reports factual can help for later reference or when creating disciplinary reports.

Create plans. If you talk to an employee about performance, you should have a plan to help them improve in place.

In these cases, it can show that actions were taken to help an employee create a path for success and give the employee the opportunity and support to succeed.

Stay honest. In a role like this, where you’re responsible for documenting workplace events, it’s important that you stay honest and unbiased.

Keep your reports as honest and factual as possible. Try not to stretch the truth or make guesses at why an employee is behaving in a certain way.

Reread your records. Before submitting a formal document, take a moment to reread it and make sure you followed the appropriate format, used clear language, and followed these tips.

Taking a second to edit your work will help you catch any errors and give you a chance to make sure you followed proper protocol.

Information Sheet 2.4: Workplace Quality Indicators

Quality indicators are tools used to measure and monitor a company’s performance and are among the principal types of process performance indicators, or the famous KPI’s (Key Performance Indicators).

In management processes, indicators are managers’ best friends, as they measure the difference between the desired situation (goal) and the current situation (result).

They point the way and are an indispensable benchmark.

Quality KPI’s can be diversified and have the function of measuring the final result by means of pre-established standards.

Example: A company guaranteed 100% of deliveries on time. So that’s an indicator of quality.

When using quality indicators, it is extremely important to regularly access accurate, reliable and good quality data.

Below, we will present some KPI’s (key performance indicators) for quality assurance examples for your business to progress.

What are the advantages of quality indicators?

Before we talk about quality indicators, see what you can do with them in order to drive the desired results for your company to satisfy your customers:

Produce improvements;
Carry out appropriate planning;
Obtain information to aid decision making;
Rapid reactivity to criticality;
Make better use of resources;
Improve service quality.

Key performance indicators

1) Efficiency Indicator – Productivity

It is responsible for measuring how many resources are needed to carry out production.

With this diagnosis, it is possible to identify wastes that should be avoided and allow greater productivity.

It is important to know the number of times something needs to be redone or a resource used during a process, for example. This directly impacts budget reviews and delivery schedules.

How is calculated this quality KPI? Through the adoption of production management software (with raw material purchasing modules, costs, delivery time, etc.).

2) Impact Indicator – Customer Satisfaction and Fidelity

Elaborating on research to know if customers are satisfied, if they would buy again and would recommend your service is imperative to the success of your business.

How is calculated this quality KPI? Ideally, you should go straight to the source. Do good research on your customers to study the strength of your product or service in the market.

The best idea is to email a satisfaction survey (quick, objective and concise), or use automated search platforms that do this using the NPS methodology, for example.

3) Effectiveness Indicator – Value

How do you know if your product or service actually works? This indicator will help you understand the influence and relevance that what you offer has in the life of customers.

How is calculated this quality KPI? Satisfaction and market research are good options for defining indicators. Stay attentive to news in your industry and also your competitors.

4) Customer Service Indicator – Customer Complaints

Customers are the business thermometer. If they are complaining a lot, it’s a sign that things are not going well at all.

Take control of the organization internally, as this is reflected externally. Make sure the “cogs” of the company are working properly and if employees are performing their tasks successfully and striving to provide the best care.

How is calculated this quality KPI? Pay attention to after-sales service. Create a friendly relationship and worry about your client even after closing the deal. Thus, you will earn their loyalty and your company will have a good market reputation.

Another important and increasingly talked about point is the customer experience. You need to know the behavior of the consumer to create a memorable experience for them, this should become a priority, after all, the happier your customer is with the brand, the more faithful they will be.

5) Safety Indicator – Quality

This indicator is essential as it regards the effect your company has on the health or physical integrity of customers.

How is it calculated? Test before product launch. Verify that your product meets all safety measures and certification requirements and national and international standards.