T&D electric manufactures high-voltage switches and other equipment for electric utilities. One line that is staffed by three workers assembles a particular type of switch. Currently the threes workers have fixed assignments; each worker fastens a specific set of components on the switch and passes it downstream on a rolling conveyor. The conveyor has capacity to allow a queue to build up in front of each worker. The bottleneck is the middle station with a rate of 11 switches per hour. The raw processing time is 15 minutes. To improve efficiency of the line, management is considering cross-training the workers and implementing some form of flexible labor system.
(a) If current throughput is 10.5 switches per hour with an average WIP level of 5 jobs, how much potential do you think there is for a flexible work system?
(b) If current throughput is 8 switches per hour with an average WIP level of 7 jobs, how much potential do you think there is for a flexible work system?
(c) If all three workers were fully cross-trained and equipped to assemble the entire switch in parallel (i.e., no passing of jobs to cne another) and were able to amintain the current work pace of each operation, what would the capacity of the system be? What real world problems might make such a policy unattractive?