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The
Planning Office
The
Planning Office served the main
manufacturing and general service
departments in Cadby Hall and elsewhere,
as well as the company's Corner Houses and
Teashops. Its brief was to search for the
simplest way in performing the thousands
of jobs which were undertaken to produce
the company's products. It was the start
of what became known as Organisation &
Methods (O&M). All the jobs performed
by staff operating machines or working
from packing bands, conveyors, service
counters etc. called for physical effort
of some kind. It was this effort,
something that could be seen and judged,
with which the staff in the Planning
Office were concerned. The Planner's task
was to find the quickest and simplest
method of doing a job and he must strive
always to eliminate unnecessary physical
effort and consequent loss of time on the
part of the operator. The principle of
simplicity applied whether the Planner was
studying the manufacture of Swiss rolls in
Cadby Hall, the ironing of a garment at
Hayes laundry, or the service to a
customer in a teashop.
Every
job was studied in great detail and the
Planner had to be certain of the purpose
of the job under study. He (they were
almost exclusively male) first studied the
whole job to see exactly what was done,
then he broke the job down into easily
recognisable elements and prepared to
investigate each element in turn. He had
to ask himself if the equipment was
suitable for the job or could something
more suitable improve the task. Could the
layout of the work place be improved. Did
the operator have the materials at hand,
within easy reach, to do the job. What
movements were required of the operator
and could they be simplified. Many jobs
could not be started until others had been
completed and delays of this sort were
investigated.
Having
satisfied himself as to the method, the
Planner then set about calculating a
standard time a job should take. As in the
offices, Planners were obsessed with
standard times and these were considered
vital to planning work in the factories
and other department. One of the factors
which had to be taken into account was the
fact that many of the company's products
were perishable foodstuff which had to be
supplied to agents and establishments
according to a rigid timescale. Every
stage in production and distribution was
timed as precisely as possible since a
delay of only a few minutes could make
itself felt along the line and possibly in
other departments as well. Apart from
their use in production and distribution,
the standard times were supplied to two
other offices. The Statistical Office used
them in calculating the cost of the labour
required for the production of an article.
And the Wages Office used them to prepare
labour statistics and to calculate premium
bonuses for those people in the factories
who were engaged on work for which a bonus
was paid.
The
Planning Office was organised in twelve
sections. Eleven of the sections carried
out the functions described above for a
particular department or group of
departments. A section used to consist of
from four to six Planners depending upon
the volume of work involved, all working
under a section supervisor. Most of the
sections were accommodated in Cadby Hall
(St Mary's College), even though in some
cases their studies were made in
departments outside. However, for
convenience of management, Planning
Sections were placed at Hayes Laundry,
Greenford, Rannoch Road and Orchard House.
The twelfth section was the Typist
Section, which provided a service for all
Planners based at Cadby Hall. In a
predominantly male office, the small
number of girls had the task of typing and
issuing the hundreds of detailed
specifications of the jobs which had been
studied, typing reports and providing a
filing service. Some 3,000 detailed
specifications of jobs were issued every
year, quite apart from special reports.
The work of the office affected in some
way the work of some 15,00o of the
company's employees at Cadby Hall.
©
Peter Bird 2005
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