We use time in different ways. We trade time for different resources.
Maybe you’ve popped for a more expensive package at a magical theme park that makes your lines shorter. Maybe you’ve debated parking quickly vs. parking close to the store (a very real thing in snow country). You probably have your own examples.
We do this in manufacturing all the time. Most assuredly there are more than three ways that we try to manipulate time, but the following ways are very important when you consider the technology infiltration that is the Fifth Wave:
Time compression: This is a big category that includes speed and power (e.g. a new laser source with improved ips), some automation (automatic tool changing in press brakes and punches are good examples) and some technologies added into an existing platform (like the ability to create an ad hoc nest on a remnant that is essentially tossed onto the cutting bed). In all of these cases, time shrinks.
Time substitution: In this case, we are manipulating people time. A good example is a robot that takes over part-picking or packaging, or some other repetitive task that, over time, would harm a worker. You can look at this as job substitution in some cases. We let the robot do dull, dirty, dangerous work and redeploy the people to do work that is perhaps more interesting and certainly less wearing physically. One example of redeployment is moving someone from part-picking to managing a team of robots.
“Masked” time: I first heard this term from Giovanni Piccolo of Salvagnini when he spoke about processes happening simultaneously, and thus one process was “masked” because of the simultaneity. It may even happen in a “black box” in the background. You can think of it as parallel vs. serial or multi-threaded vs. single-threaded. No matter how you choose to think about it, they are happening at the same time, and the concept is not limited to only two concurrent processes. An example might be deburring parts while setting up a bending or welding operation for those same parts. An important distinction is that you look at the gains by clock time, not by accrued time (or “shop time” as defined at car dealerships everywhere). You can—and should—charge for the time of each concurrent process. If you can get the product out the door in clock time before the end-to-end placement of all the process time, you have claimed a victory of sorts.
While the ability to mold time to one’s advantage is a great thing, it does bring at least one challenge. Because time slices are getting much thinner (in the automated tooling example, it takes only a few minutes), we are left wondering what the operator can possibly do usefully during that time? Is it a built-in bio break? Time to check the phone?
Or, because of all the time savings, are we willing to lose people productivity for a few minutes to make the significant gains (up to a 9:1 ratio) of the work being done? It remains a difficult question, and I would love to hear what you have to say about it.