Keeping it clean

US: A place for everything, and everything in its place. Does this describe your workplace? Or does your office look as if a hurricane had just blown through?

In the past, many companies tolerated messy desks and chaotic filing systems, as long as their employees were productive. But more and more of them are adopting a Japanese efficiency method known as 5S, which requires that offices be kept neat and free of personal items.

The term 5S is short for “sort, straighten, shine, standardize and sustain”. Some companies have hired so-called “5S inspectors”, who check colleagues’ workplaces to make sure that they are following the system.

Jay Scovie of Kyocera Corp. in San Diego, California, is one employee who has had to change his messy ways. His company, which makes solar panels, is owned by a Japanese firm. It appointed a 5S inspector earlier this year. Scovie tried to get around the new rules by packing items from his desk into boxes and putting them in cabinets. But this wasn’t enough for the company.

Scovie, the company’s communications manager, has accepted the new system. In the past, he says, he found things “based on a mental picture in my mind”. He told The Wall Street Journal: “It was efficient in certain ways, but not in others. It wasn’t efficient if someone unfamiliar with my work habits had to find something in my work area.”

Jay Scovie says he used to find things "based on a mental picture in my mind".

Meanwhile, Virginia Mason Medical Center in Seattle switched to the 5S system in 2002. Doctors, nurses and their assistants share desks that are grouped together. The desks have to be kept neat because personnel from the next shift will be using them.

Health worker John Boze says he is not naturally tidy, so getting used to the 5S method hasn’t been easy. Unfortunately, he hasn’t been able to implement it outside the office. “My girlfriend says I need to 5S my desk at home,” Boze comments. “She says it looks like I’m building a nest.”