Operation

In work analysis and synthesis, a work process (also work process ) is the performance or sequence of operations that a task holder carries out on a work object for the purpose of fulfilling a task .

General

In economic units ( companies , states with their subdivisions such as public administration ), the work tasks assigned to a position usually consist of a large number of individual process sections ( work steps ; English task ), which can only be viewed as completed in their entirety by a final, completing work step. Many of these process sections are functionally, physically or technically dependent on one another, so that a certain sequence ( sequence of operations ) must be adhered to during the work process . For this purpose, workers mostly use work equipment in order to achieve a work result based on the specified work task . The REFA also requires that a unit of measure for an order ( work volume ) is generated during the work process. For more complex workflows, it is worth creating workflow plans with organizational charts .

For this purpose, a work process is divided into process sections by work planning , taking technical or organizational conditions into account , and documented in a work plan.

• Technical conditions are machine equipment , qualification of the workforce and lot size (quantity).
• Organizational conditions can be different production locations, intermediate storage of semi-finished products or operations that have to be processed outside the company.

Tasks that require different machines or resources are divided into workstation-related work processes that usually have to be carried out one after the other.

The Federal Labor Court (BAG) understands a work process as a " work unit of an employee's activity leading to a certain work result that can be delimited and legally independently assessed by adding in the contextual activities and taking into account a sensible, sensible administrative exercise ."

species

One distinguishes

• order-oriented operations : belong to an order which is determined by quantity and date ; accordingly, after scheduling and capacity planning, the start and end dates of the work cycle and the time required for resources for the specific order are known.
• Standard work steps: are a specific work step that is carried out with a specific technical process, without reference to an overall process or work plan and is order-neutral.
• Order -neutral operations : are also without reference to an order, without start and end dates and therefore without scheduled capacity requirements . Like the parts lists, they belong to the master or basic data of production planning .

The order-oriented work processes are the only work processes related to a customer order.

Analysis of the work processes

The description of a work process includes:

• the identification of the activity ,
• a textual description of the work to be carried out,
• the required workplace or the required group of similar workplaces and possible alternative workplaces,
• additionally required work equipment such as drawings , NC programs , gauges , tools and devices and
• the times for carrying out the work such as set-up time , processing time as well as waiting and transport times .

These criteria are taken into account as target specifications in a schedule and can also be part of a job description .

Delimitation of the work processes

The beginning and end of a uniform work process play a major role in work planning. That is why there are delimitation criteria through which work processes can be distinguished from one another. A new work process exists when

• the agent changes,
• the work object changes,
• the work object is broken down into several objects or several work objects are combined into a single one,
• the work equipment changes or
• a certain state of the work object is reached (e.g. a sheet is full).

Changing agents, work objects or work equipment can thus represent the cause of a new work process.

Production process

In the production process , various work processes overlap, taking into account the specified sequence. The process organization uses process plans to ensure that the various points involved in the process plan form a seamlessly functioning production chain. The work plan must subdivide the work process into process sections, taking technical or organizational conditions into account, and document them in the work plan. In production, a distinction is made between manufacturing operations ( e.g. turning , hardening , grinding ) and assembly operations (pre-assembly, component assembly, final assembly).

If the planned work process is unexpectedly interrupted or disrupted, there is a malfunction . Appropriate workflow planning ensures smooth workflows and eliminates existing weak points through weak point analyzes .

Individual evidence

1. ↑ REFA Association for Work Studies and Business Organization e. V. (Ed.), Methods of Business Organization: Lexicon of Business Organization , 1993, p. 195 ( ISBN 3-446-17523-7 )
2. ↑ BAG, judgment of November 25, 1981, Az .: 4 AZR 305/79
3. ↑ Thomas Geib, Business Process Oriented Tool Management , 1997, p. 137
4. ^ August-Wilhelm Scheer, Wirtschaftsinformatik: Reference models for industrial business processes , 1994, p. 213
5. ↑ Heinrich B. Acker, Organizational Analysis - Procedures and Techniques for Practical Organizational Work , 1973, p. 79