Understanding, Measuring, and Improving 5S for Operations to Support TPM: How to Build the Foundation for Autonomous Maintenance

Many sites introduce 5S and Total Productive Maintenance (TPM) into their production areas, but they are disappointed as improvements are not sustained, especially if more than one shift is involved. To address this issue, this book presents an approach to 5S thinking that assists sites to establish Production Area Based Teams of four to eight members including a designated Production Frontline Leader with effective responsibility for their workplace. Then through an inductive approach of emotive questioning, all Production Area Based Team members are engaged to embrace 5S thinking through an improvement activity called Work Area Management, an enhanced version of 5S and a prerequisite for successful implementation of TPM’s Autonomous Maintenance.

This approach uses a ten-step process and initially focuses on the Work Area to minimise extra work thrown to the Maintenance Department. It involves allocating Focus Points to each team member other than the Production Frontline Leader to ensure involvement and accountability, introducing Compliance Audits for agreed standards to reinforce correct behaviours and Improvement Sheets to ensure agreement between shifts before implementing any changes. This results in a sustained neat work area with a ‘place for everything and everything in its place’ but more importantly a work area where standards are agreed upon and respected across all shifts.

This approach also provides a very solid foundation for going forward with TPM’s Autonomous Maintenance, which includes 5S thinking for the equipment to achieve a failure-free (zero breakdowns), trouble-free (zero quality problems) and safe workplace (zero accidents and incidents).

Ross Kenneth Kennedy, who is based in Wollongong, NSW, Australia, founded The Centre for TPM (Australasia) or CTPM in 1996 after more than 20 years of manufacturing and operational experience covering maintenance, production, operations, and executive roles, along with 5 years of international consulting experience. Ross has been actively involved with the application of Total Productive Maintenance (TPM) since 1990.

In 1998, he developed and launched an Australasian version of the Japanese TPM methodology with a strong focus on Human Capital Development through Ongoing Improvement. Under Ross’s leadership, CTPM assisted Manufacturing, Mining, Process Industries, Utilities, and Service companies throughout Australia, New Zealand, Thailand, and Indonesia to strive for and achieve TPM & Operational Excellence.

In February 2022, Ross sold CTPM so that he could retire; however, demand from several key clients has turned this into semi-retirement as he continues to guide several sites in Australia and New Zealand on their TPM journey to Operational Excellence while also writing further books on TPM-related topics. Ross’s approach is to act as a TPM & Operational Excellence catalyst by working closely with management and frontline personnel to engage them in developing the discipline to accelerate their TPM & Operational Excellence journey. Ross is also an international author of 2 acclaimed books: Understanding, Measuring, and Improving Overall Equipment Effectiveness; and Understanding, Measuring, and Improving Daily Management.