Control of Production

Abstract

The author sets out to describe the basic principles of production control, and after a brief analysis of the nature of the problem, administrative set-up is described, and reference made to the work of Taylor. The importance of apportioning material before it is issued from the store is emphasized, and the fundamentals of stores accountancy are stated.

Accurate and exact planning is the keystone of good production control, and the consecutive processes to which each part must be subjected in the planning department are described. One of the most important of these is the difficult job of estimating standard times of manufacture; records of past performance are useful, but the only really reliable method is time study, the principles of which are very briefly mentioned.

No plan of manufacture will work to schedule without a good scheme of incentives for the workers. The guiding principles which have to be kept in mind when preparing a bonus scheme are discussed, and the use of standard minutes applied to individuals and groups is considered.

The general lines of procedure on which production control in the works should operate are given in a consecutive form, from the actual booking of an order to the processing of parts through the plant, and the collection afterwards of records of performance. The requirements of production control are then listed under ten headings, and the paper concludes with a few of the more practical points which occur, in firms of various sizes, where parts are being processed to a pre-arranged plan.