Computer Aided Time & Motion Study 

I will be calling the software developed for Time & Motion study as “Timesoft”. What I observed in the traditional method was the tremendous difficulty being faced by the operator in watching the stopwatch and the action simultaneously and then simultaneously noting down the time at the completion of each element.

The task requires considerable skill and consumes a lot of time as many iterations are required for successful completion of even one cycle.

Also the method involves a much higher degree of inaccuracy. 

This is where the greatest advantage of Timesoft lies. It eliminates the use of stopwatch and pen & paper itself. The operator will as usual observe the activity and divide it into certain elements. These are then feeded in sequence at their place.

Once done this all the operator is required to do now is to just observe the activity and simply click a button at the completion of every element. At every click the time required for that particular element is automatically recorded against it.

With the number of simultaneous tasks for the operator reduced to one click, he has more time to focus on the activity. Also the readings are no longer required to enter manually, hence the chances of incorrectly written or misplaced readings are minimized.

All these greatly increase the accuracy of the observation.

Also it greatly simplifies the task of the operator which increases his efficiency saving the company's time and money.

The work of Timesoft is not limited only till here.

What the next biggest drawback we found in the traditional method was the cumbersome manual work still involved after taking the readings.

The repetitive calculations like finding the average time for each element, segregating the time required by different category elements (saleable, non-saleable & waste)  and then presenting it in a standard readable format and drawing Gantt charts, Pie charts, Sequence charts etc for the purpose of analysis.

This is more or less a merely wastage of time and manpower.

With Timesoft all calculations required are done automatically in no time at a mere single click. The data is presented in a standard printable form and also the required charts or diagrams can be generated very easily.

This again greatly reduces the load on the operator which increases his efficiency saving the company's time and money.

Thus we see that Timesoft has the potential to revolutionize the way time study is being done today. The study which earlier used to take hours, with the help of Timesoft could be completed in minutes.

Summarizing the advantages of Timesoft –

I)  Accurate

Timesoft eliminates:

i)     looking at a stopwatch to observe elapsed time

ii)    manual recording of data

iii)   all the calculations required

It therefore ensures greater accuracy by spending less time recording data and more time observing activity.

Also the accuracy involved with calculations is improved.

With Timesoft, human error is eliminated because start/stop times are no longer manually entered. Mistakenly written or misplaced numbers and inaccurate calculations are now a thing of the past.

II)  Time Saving

Above all it saves a lot of time  be it in recording time or that consumed in calculations.

With Timesoft the operator's work being greatly simplified, very few or no iterations are required for correctly timing a cycle and readings could be taken in one go.

And the calculations are now a matter of seconds just a click away. Also the graphs and charts required are generated automatically.

The time saved could be utilized for other useful purposes thereby increasing the productivity.

III)  Additional Features

Timesoft has got many additional features too…..

1. It calculates the no. of observations ideally required for the desired level of accuracy.

2. It can measure time in a variety of units like Deciminutes, TMU, Wink, Seconds, Microseconds etc. 

3. It can be used for more finer analysis or Micromotion study by running the video film at a slower speed. Timesoft’s clock adjusts automatically on entering the slowdown factor  and gives the actual time.

          TIMESOFT

MAIN   WINDOW

    At present the software works on a laptop\desktop computer. But since it is written in JAVA it can easily be coded for any hand held device or PDAs also.