PROCEEDINGS
OF THE TOMSK ORDER OF THE OCTOBER REVOLUTION AND ORDER
OF THE RED BANNER OF LABOR POLYTECHNIC
INSTITUTE named after S. M. KIROV

Volume 269
1976

THE INFLUENCE OF THE FUNCTIONAL DIVISION OF LABOR

ON THE STANDARD FOR MULTI-MACHINE SERVICING

A. S. BERDNIK

(Submitted by the Department of Industrial Economics
and Enterprise Organization)

Questions of the division and cooperation of labor under conditions of automated production have been discussed in print for a long time. However, in the practice of combining professions and functions there continue to remain problems that must be solved on the basis of further study and generalization of the concrete work experience of enterprises. Thus, the acute shortage and increased turnover of workers at enterprises in Siberia do not allow one to agree with the opinion of authors who emphasize the social significance of this issue: “First of all, functions are combined whose performance requires a higher qualification in comparison with the work being performed; the main goal of combination is the consistent formation of a worker whose production profile and qualifications most fully correspond to the requirements of the equipment being operated and approach the technology of the subsequent stage of production development” [1]. This purely social approach to the question of the division and cooperation of labor is unacceptable at enterprises operating under conditions of low-quality labor resources. The practice of combining professions and functions on the basis of the above-stated principle without sufficient economic substantiation leads to the result that low-skilled machine-operator personnel do not manage, in a short time, to master professions requiring a high level of technical training. In addition, guaranteed payment of labor at high tariff rates (taking into account the combined functions) does not stimulate an increase in the professional skill of workers and reduces the quality of the work they perform. Under these conditions the most acceptable principle is: “The main thing is economic indicators” [2]. Therefore, the basis of the rational organization of workers’ labor is the search for the organizational optimum in performing the entire complex of work in multi-machine, setup, repair, and other types of servicing under the conditions of a concrete production subdivision (shop, section, automatic line, etc.). In this connection, questions of combining professions and labor functions cannot be resolved without regard to the type of operations being performed, the per-operation expenditures of working time, the profession and qualification of the performer, the proportion of useful expenditures and losses of working time, etc.

A qualified solution to the question of the division and cooperation of labor presupposes the obligatory conduct of a sociological survey—

assessing the quality of labor resources, the organization and standardization of their labor, the forms of payment and material incentives applied. On the basis of the survey, conclusions are drawn about the necessity and economic efficiency of introducing changes into the established forms of labor organization in the given production subdivision.

Table 1

A similar approach was adopted as the basis for studying the labor organization of the workers servicing the milling-machine automatic line section of Shop 2 of the Tomsk Cutting Tools Plant. The milling-machine automatic line section, consisting of 70 machines, performs the operation “milling of flutes and backs of right- and left-hand drills” of 0.8–10 mm in 97 standard sizes. The qualification characteristics of the workers servicing the section are given in Table 1. The norms in force at the section and the actual zones of multi-machine servicing are given in Table 2.

Table 2

The study of the organization of workers’ labor was carried out by the methods of time study, workday photography, questionnaire survey, and interview. Analysis of the structure of work functions showed that the share of the principal functions of a multi-machine milling-machine operator amounts to only 51.7% of shift time; 22.5% of working time is spent by the milling-machine operator on performing the functions of a set-up man and a fitter for equipment repair; 9.2% is spent on organizational servicing of the workplace; 16.6% consists of breaks and losses of working time dependent on the worker.

Analysis of the primary documents of the study showed that the time expenditures for performing set-up functions among individual multi-machine operators servicing machines of the same type, depending on length of service and assigned qualification grade, range from 33 to 137 minutes per shift. A similar range of variation in working-time expenditures is found in the performance by the machine operator of the functions of a repair fitter. The low qualification level of the machine operators (Table 1) and the established practice in the section of combining functions—machine operator–set-up man–repair fitter—without taking into account the level of technical training of the working personnel are the main reasons for the use in the section of empirical-statistical norms of multi-machine servicing (Table 2).

Table 3

Table 4

As a result of the analysis of labor resources and the organization of labor in the section of milling automatics of shop No. 2 of TZRI, scientifically grounded norms for multi-machine servicing were developed for the following variants:

1) complete release of the multi-machine operator from performing the functions of the duty fitter and retention of all other functions by him;

2) complete release of the machine operator from performing the functions of the se—

the adjuster and the mechanic retaining for him a number of preparatory functions, the performance of which does not require substantial expenditures of working time from the machine operator and can be organized before the beginning of the work shift. The calculation of scientifically substantiated norms for multi-machine servicing was performed on the basis of the theory of mass servicing according to a scheme with possible waiting for servicing and with the determination of optimal zones by the criterion of minimum production costs [3]. Table 3 gives an example of elementary norms for servicing one magazine of the 6789 model milling automatic machine. As can be seen from Table 3, the time for servicing one request (magazine) is determined by the composition of the functions performed and their duration, i.e., by the adopted variant of the division of servicing functions and by the level of professional skill of the workers.

Fig. 1. Graph of changes in production losses caused by downtime of the machine \(C_{\mathrm{st}}\) and the operator \(C_p\), and of their sum \(C_p+C_{\mathrm{st}}\), depending on the adopted variant of the division of labor:
— existing variant of the division of labor,
— optimal variant of the division of labor

Table 4 gives the initial data for determining the optimal zones of multi-machine servicing for model 6789, corresponding to the above-mentioned variants of the division of workers’ functions. Fig. 1 illustrates the change in norms of multi-machine servicing depending on the adopted variant of division and cooperation of labor.

REFERENCES

1. P. L. Ezerskii. Analysis and Evaluation of the Level of Labor Organization at an Enterprise. Moscow, “Ekonomika,” 1969.

2. I. I. Shapiro. Scientific and technological progress and labor standardization. “Sotsialisticheskii trud,” 1970, No. 11.

3. V. Gorodetskii. Development of forms of division and cooperation of labor at an industrial enterprise. “Sotsialisticheskii trud,” 1970, No. 12.