Editor's note: Literally speaking, 5S refers to five words that start with the Roman letter "S" in Japanese pronunciation. These are: Seiri (clearance), Seiton (tidying), Seiso (cleaning), Seiketsu (neatness), and Shitsuke (discipline). These five words and their meanings sound very simple, but they can have a profound impact on a company’s culture…
Company K is a printing enterprise mainly focusing on corrugated cardboard boxes for packaging, screen printing, and traditional offset printing businesses. Two years ago, the company implemented a "Printing Management Information System," which indeed played a significant role in the highly competitive printing market. At this time, Mr. Hou, the general manager of the company, began to focus on the field of full digital printing.
Accepting the 5S Challenge
Company K was negotiating a joint venture project with a Hong Kong company. The project aimed to introduce new digital printing equipment and processes into Company K while upgrading its printing information system.
However, negotiations with the Hong Kong partner were not proceeding smoothly. They raised many what Mr. Hou considered overly "critical" opinions about Company K’s factory management: for example, the paper, ink, and tools in the warehouse and workshop were not neatly arranged; the floor wasn't clean enough, and the printing machines were so greasy as to be "unbearable"; even the workers' uniforms were deemed "unsatisfactory"...
Later, in the partnership terms, the investor insisted on including "the introduction of the 5S methodology for modern manufacturing enterprise site management" as a necessary condition in the contract text.
At first, Mr. Hou and the company management thought the Hong Kong side was making a mountain out of a molehill. "Isn't it just about cleaning up and making the environment more pleasant?" Mr. Hou felt these things were too "basic" and had little to do with modern management or information management.
Nevertheless, to ensure the smooth progress of the partnership, Mr. Hou readily agreed.
Months later, reflecting on these 'trivial matters,' Mr. Hou had a sense of "deep-rooted habits being hard to change."
The Shock of 'Trivial Matters'
To implement the "5S management method" that became popular in Japanese manufacturing enterprises in the 1950s, a lot of preparation and training work needed to be done.
From a literal standpoint, 5S refers to five words that start with the Roman letter "S" in Japanese pronunciation: Seiri (clearance), Seiton (tidying), Seiso (cleaning), Seiketsu (neatness), and Shitsuke (discipline).
These five words and their meanings sounded very simple at first, and everyone didn't take them seriously.
A few days later, Mr. Mak, sent by the Hong Kong side to guide the implementation of 5S, conducted an on-site inspection and used a large number of on-site photos and investigation data to give the leadership and employees of Company K a strong shock.
Mr. Mak found that various types of paper were always piled up on the floor of the printing workshop, some currently in use, others "brought over by someone unknown." Discarded ink and removed rollers and screens lay in one corner of the workshop, covered in grease. Workers' tools lacked clear markings, and finding a suitable tool required considerable effort.
The situation in the warehouse was no better.
Between the shelves storing paper, ink, and spare parts and those for finished products, there was only a narrow, unpartitioned passage. Mismatched inventory numbers and goods were commonplace. Sometimes, leftover paper from the workshop would mix with newly ordered paper rolls, leaving no one able to clearly account for how much had been issued.
Mr. Mak also examined the MIS system that Mr. Hou took pride in, checking several computers placed in the planning, sales, and procurement departments. He found that files on the hard drives were in complete disarray. Everywhere there were randomly created subdirectories and files. Some subdirectories and files could not be identified without opening them. Moreover, Mr. Mak discovered countless file versions, outdated files, temporary files, erroneous files, or multiple copies of the same file.
In Company K, such phenomena had long been taken for granted: things you wanted were always hard to find, while unnecessary items were not discarded in time and seemed to always get in the way. In the workshop, on desks, in filing cabinets...
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