Contents

1. INTRODUCTION ................................................................................................................................ 1

2. OBJECTIVES ....................................................................................................................................... 1

3. METHODOLOGY ............................................................................................................................... 1

4. PROCEDURE ....................................................................................................................................... 2

5. TIME STUDY ACTIVITY ................................................................................................................... 4

6. FINDINGS AND DISCUSSIONS ........................................................................................................ 6

6.1 Advantages of the software ........................................................................................................... 6

6.2 Challenges and Limitations of the Software ................................................................................. 8
6.3 Possible solutions to challenges and software limitations .......................................................... 11
6.4 Comparisons between the two methods ...................................................................................... 12
7. CONCLUSIONS AND RECOMMENDATIONS ............................................................................. 13

7.1 Conclusions ................................................................................................................................. 13

7.2 Recommendations ...................................................................................................................... 13

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1. INTRODUCTION

Work study is the systematic examination of the methods of carrying on activities so as to

improve the effective use of resources and to set up standards of performance for the activities
being carried out. It consists of method study and work measurement.

Method study is the systematic recording and critical examination of ways of doing things in
order to make improvements.

Time study is a work measurement technique for recording the times of performing a certain
specific job or its elements carried out under specified conditions, and for analyzing the data so
as to obtain the time necessary for an operator to carry it out at a defined rate of performance.

Various tools and techniques have been used so far to carry out time study activities. Stopwatch
is the most predominantly used time study technique in manufacturing industries.

NUVIZZ mobile time study apps is another newly developed application software intended for
conducting time and motion study to create engineered labor standards primarily in areas like
manufacturing and logistics.

2. OBJECTIVES

The objective of this project is to study the applicability and feasibility of NUVIZZ mobile time
study apps in time study activities in sewing operations and identify its pros and cons compared
to traditional stopwatch time study methods.

3. METHODOLOGY

The following methodologies were used to carry out the study:

 Studying and understanding the operation of the software. Downloading the software and
installing on our android OS based mobiles and practicing on how to operate. Some
helpful materials, manuals and notes, were also downloaded and reviewed to understand
how the software is to be operated.
 Selecting and capturing video recordings of 3 to 5 various sewing operations from
production lines.

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  Identifying elemental breakdowns of selected operations and recording them in the
software. As provided in the software format, all elements in the operations are recorded
as “elements” and group of elements or operations as “Transactions”. Necessary
additional information is also recorded as attributes.
 Evaluating the difficulties in application of the software and identifying its limitations of
the software.
 Recommending the possible ways of better application of the software in the sewing
operations, for time study purpose, regardless the inherent limitations of the software.

4. PROCEDURE

The following general procedural steps are followed to use the software.

Step 1: Download the software from internet

The NUVIZZ INC. software company has developed and availed the apps software free of any
charge. It requires subscription only for exporting of data in excel format. Three days trial period
is also available free of charge.

Step 2: Open the software

Open the software from mobile screen navigating through apps files.

Step 3: Select operation to be time studied

Operations on which time study is to be conducted are selected under this step. Five operations
namely; Pocket attaching, Collar attaching, Collar finishing, Button hole making, and Bottom
hemming were selected for study purpose.

Step 4: Create discrete elements

Once the operations are identified the next step is to break the operations in to discrete elements.
Then these elements will be filled in the software app, under the “Elements” label. You can
specify the name of the element, type of element – standard or delay and assign attributes to be
captured for the element during the time study. There is no limit on the number of attributes that
you can assign to an element.

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Step 5: Create transactions

The operations selected under step 3 can be considered as transactions. A transaction is a set of
elements. Transaction is created by choosing from the elements and arranging them based on the
sequence of operation. Just as in the case of elements, you can assign attributes to transactions.

Step 6: Carry out time study

Time Study is the core of the application. Here time study for any selected transaction can be
done by capturing the different elements’ time. You can start/stop elements, automatically
capture the element time, capture delay elements and total transaction time. You can also capture
audio, video and notes while studying the activity without suspending the time study.

Step 7: Exporting Data

The captured studies data can be exported into excel for easy analysis. Study data can be
exported either by an individual transaction or for all transactions. The configuration data
(elements, transactions, attributes) can also be exported from one device and imported into
another reducing configuration time when using the application on multiple devices.

To do these, subscription is required at two packages; 19$ for one month and 45$ for three
months time period. Three days period free access is also available for the first time.

Step 8: Analyze data

Once the necessary data is captured and exported in excel form, they can be further analyzed to
determine the standard times.

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 5. TIME STUDY ACTIVITY

Five operations have been selected for study purpose. Two operations were selected from lady’s
long shirt product style, and the remaining three from normal lady shirt were selected. One IE
person was made to involve in the study, to some extent.

Conventional Stopwatch time was also conducted on the same operations so that comparisons
would be done between the two methods.

The result of the study is discussed as follows.

Table 1: Time study results by two methods

OBSERVED TIME (seconds)

Elements/Transactions NUVIZZ APP STOPWATCH
C1 C2 C3 C4 C5 Av. C1 C2 C3 C4 C5 Av.

Transaction 1: Pocket attaching

Ele.1: Picking the product 4.98 5.56 9.04 4.47 3.95 5.60 3 4 4 5 5 4.2
Ele.2: Arranging and placing front 8.13 7.72 5.71 8.23 6.09 7.18 6 10 7 9 6 7.6
panel on table
Ele.3: Pocket placing & inserting 5.01 4.77 4.40 5.10 7.08 5.27 6 5 5 4 4 4.8
under presser foot
Ele.4: Stitching 35.5 27.6 29.7 27.5 27.7 29.6 37 36 38 34 34 35.8
Ele.5: Remove, Judge & dispose 9.64 6.00 8.38 9.23 7.70 8.19 5 7 7 5 6 6

Total (Approximated) 56 58.4

Transaction 2: Collar attaching

Ele.1: Picking the product 8.36 12.7 16.3 13.4 - 12.7 9 11 11 12 11 10.8

Ele.2: Product arranging and placing 21.9 25.7 16.4 19.5 - 20.9 21 21 20 19 21 20.4
under presser foot
Ele.3: Stitching 58.9 59.9 71.5 75.1 - 66.4 74 71 75 74 68 72.4

Ele.4: Remove, Judge & dispose 6.47 4.84 12.6 15 - 9.73 5 7 8 8 7 7.0

110 110.6
Total (Approximated)

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 OBSERVED TIME (seconds)
Elements/Transactions NUVIZZ APP STOPWATCH
C1 C2 C3 C4 C5 Av. C1 C2 C3 C4 C5 Av.

Transaction 3: Collar finishing

Ele.1: Picking the product 2.21 6.5 4.16 2.83 4.50 4.04 4 3 5 4 5 4.2

Ele.2: Product arranging and placing 4.66 4.09 4.88 4.28 4.64 4.51 4 5 4 4 4 4.2
under presser foot
Ele.3: Stitching 49.6 40.8 43.2 46.9 42.6 44.6 49 45 47 46 45 46.4

Ele.4: Remove, Judge & dispose 4.46 10.0 6.02 4.70 4.77 5.99 6 5 6 5 6 5.6

Total (Approximated) 59 60.4

Transaction 4: Button hole making

Ele.1: Picking the product 1.63 1.74 1.87 1.01 1.86 1.62 1.4 1.3 1.4 1.1 1.3 1.3

Ele.2: Product arranging and placing 2.19 3.08 2.07 2.34 2.55 2 2 3 3 2 2.4
under presser foot 3.08
Ele.3: Button hole making 15.3 15.5 16.1 16.7 14.9 15.7 15 16 18 15 15 15.8

Ele.4: Remove, Judge & dispose 0.77 1.57 1.31 1.34 0.78 1.15 2 2 1 1 1 1.4

Total (Approximated) 21 20.9

Transaction 5: Bottom hemming

Ele.1: Picking the product 3.62 2.31 1.73 - - 2.55 1 2 2.4 2.4 2 1.8

Ele.2: Product arranging and placing 3.31 4.51 4.39 - - 4.07 6 4 5 4 4 4.6
under presser foot
Ele.3: Stitching 25.5 23.8 22 - - 23.8 22 26 24 24 25 23.8

Ele.4: Remove, Judge & dispose 3.41 1.54 1.54 - - 2.16 1.2 1.4 1.4 1.6 1.7 1.3

Total (Approximated) 33 32.2

Transaction 1 and 2 are operations on lady’s long shirt garment, and the rest three are on lady’s
normal shirt garment.

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6. FINDINGS AND DISCUSSIONS

6.1 Advantages of the software

a. Enables to capture all necessary information beforehand

The software has a feature which enables to record and maintain all necessary information such
as: the name of the product, name of operator, style number, etc, related to each elements and
transactions. These are recorded as attributes in the software.

Fig 1: Information recorded as attributes

b. Enables to capture notes, audios and video records during time study

The software also has a feature which enables the time study person to take additional notes,
audio and video recordings while time study is going on. These can be done for every element in
the transaction. This information may be helpful during analyzing the final data.

Fig 2: a. Audio record b. Video capture c. Text note

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 c. Suitable to capture idle times that may occur during time study

The software enables one to record elements in to two categories as ‘standard’ and ‘delay’. Any
time spent on non standard activities could be categorized as ‘delays’. Therefore; all possible idle
times that may occur during time study could be pre-identified and recorded while elements are
recorded. Then one can easily switch to ‘delay’ label and record these idle times as delays. This
will be helpful in determining allowances and also in method study practices.

Fig 3: Delay time

d. Eliminates paper work

In application of NUVIZZ mobile time study app, there will be almost no paper work, except to
get print out of the final data analysis result.

No formats are required to collect data. This contributes to savings from stationary
consumptions.

e. Export data in to excel sheet

Once time study is correctly conducted, the data exported to excel sheet will be readily available
for analysis. The software automatically arranges the data in to a format suitable for further
analysis, and it also calculates the average, in the case time study is conducted for multiple
cycles of the activity. All the necessary information, including the start and end date and time is
recorded.

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 Fig 4: Data Exported to Excel Sheet

6.2 Challenges and Limitations of the Software

The following are some of the possible challenges and limitations of the software related to
application of the software.

a. Need of preparation before time study

The software requires the time study person to prepare necessary information before time study
is conducted. Most time study personnel, however, don’t have that much encouragement to make
preparations for time study purpose.

It is common to see, especially in apparel industries, time study persons doing time studies on
operation/activity level, rather than on elemental level.

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In this software, however, discrete elements within activity/transactions need to be thoroughly
identified and recorded in the software in advance to actual time study activity.

b. Requires high consciousness level during time study

Since some elements may take a very short period of time to complete, it requires the time study
person to be highly conscious so that he/she should click on the next element’s label. Otherwise,
the some portion of the time spent on one element may be taken to the other.

c. Unable to stop and resume the time

In conventional stopwatch time study technique, we can stop and resume the time at any time we
want to do so. In NUVIZZ app, however; we can’t stop and resume the time.

Fig 5: a. before stop b. after stop

As we can see in fig 5: a –b, if we click the ‘stop’ label, it will completely stop the time study
activity for that transaction, and will never allow us to resume back to continuo the time study
process, from where we stopped.

Fig 6: a. before stop b. after stop c. after resume

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In fig 6: a - c, we can see that we can stop and resume the stopwatch. This is done when
activities which are not part of the work under study are occurring while time study is carried
out. These activities could be machine break down, thread breakage, material arrangement,
rework, etc. Note that the differences in time, in the figures, happened due to delays in photo
capturing.

d. Corrections required to analyze exported data

NUVIZZ time study app enables us to take any non-standard times as ‘delays’, the function
which can to some extent replace the stop-resume function of that of conventional stopwatch.
However; if these delays occur within a single element, i.e. before a given element is completed
and hence shifting to delay is requires, it takes the second time taken for the remaining portion as
a complete new cycle time.

This data should be corrected in the excel sheet before analyzing the data. For example see the
exported data in fig 4. In the first cycle, delay was captured as stitching was under process, and
then the remaining time to complete stitching was captured. The software recorded these times as
complete two cycles. You can see this from the ‘Element summary’ report. The actual number of
cycles was 7, but stitching was reported as 8. This affects the actual average time for that specific
operation.

Fig 7: a. before delay b. delay c. back to operation d. operation after delay

Fig 7: a – d, shows how time study restart operation time from zero after shifting back from
delay time.

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 e. Selective removal of configuration data is impossible

Once the time study is carried out for the recorded elements or transactions, there is no any
means to select and delete any selected configuration data. The delete option in the software will
be work. Lack of this feature poses the problem of maintaining unnecessary data and exporting
garbage of data to excel, which makes the time study person uncomfortable with the apps.

The software gives an option to maintain or to remove the exported data from the software only
during exporting. Otherwise one has to uninstall and again reinstall the software to get his mobile
cleared of unnecessary data. Previous configuration data will also be deleted when importing
configuration data from another application.

f. Frequent subscription is required

The app software is available free of any charges and can be downloaded and easily installed on
window or android supported smart phones. In order to export the final time study data to excel
sheet, however; it requires for subscription. The subscription option has two packages; 1) For
one month and 2) for three months.

This frequent subscription is not comfortable for most companies, and may tend to stick to
conventional stopwatch technique of time study.

6.3 Possible solutions to challenges and software limitations

Table 2: Possible solutions to challenges and limitations

S/N Challenges Possible solutions

1 Need of preparation  Standardization of work elements for similar operations will reduce need of
before time study identification and recording of elements for every style.

2 Requires high  Clubbing very small elements so that the time taken for an element will not be
consciousness level too small. A minimum of 2.4 sec is usually recommended.
during time study

3 Unable to stop and  Taking non-standard activities under ‘delay’ activity. All possible non-standard
resume the time activities shall be identified and recorded before time study is started.

4 Corrections required to  Avoiding chance of occurrence of non-standard activities as time study is taken
analyze exported data

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S/N Challenges Possible solutions
for an element. i.e. taking non-standard activities to the end of an element,
wherever possible.
Selective removal of  Recording correct data right first time. i.e. proper preparation
configuration data is  Making time study with maximum conscious level, so that chance of making
impossible wrong time study
Frequent subscription  Using the app only for selective time study purposes and doing the same in a
is required planned manner, so that the task will be completed within the subscription
periods.

6.4 Comparisons between the two methods

Results obtained from time study conducted on the five operations, described under Table 1,
using NUVIZZ time study app and conventional stopwatch technique is presented as follows.
For each operations time was taken for five cycles, except on two operations for NUVIZZ, and
average time was calculated for both techniques.

Table 3: Time study comparison between results from NUVIZZ time study app, and
Conventional Stopwatch methods

Comparison factors NUVIZZ APP STOPWATCH

1. Observed Time (seconds)
Transaction 1: Pocket attaching 56 58.4
Transaction 2: Collar attaching 110 110.6
Transaction 3: Collar finishing 59 60.4
Transaction 4: Button hole making 21 20.9
Transaction 5: Bottom hemming 33 32.2
2. Work study time Low High
3. Preparation requirement same same
4. Paper work No High
5. Analysis time Low High
6. Investment requirement High Low
7. Reliability High Medium
8. Accessibility Subscription required Easily accessible
9. Easiness to work with Low High
10. IE perception towards its application Medium High

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7. CONCLUSIONS AND RECOMMENDATIONS

7.1 Conclusions

From the exploratory study conducted on the application of NUVIZZ mobile time study app for
time study purpose in apparel industry, we can conclude the following.

 Provided that it is applied in proper procedures, the software can provide us with reliable
time study data, so that it can be used for further analysis and production standardization.
 The time study person requires acquiring basic trainings and experiences on the software
in order to obtain correct results.
 Standardization of work elements will help in reducing the time spent on preparation
phases, and this will ease the task of the time study person.
 The app software itself has some limitations in managing data. Example, configuration
data deleting is impossible once time study is done for a given element/ configuration

7.2 Recommendations

 Adequate training should be given to the time study person before doing the actual time
study practice using the app software.
 The software company should work on limitations of the software to make it more user
friendly, and the one enabling data management easy and flexible. Example: to save, edit,
delete, etc. Also, shifting between operations, and also, between operation and delay
activity should be mad simple.
 The software company should change its marketing strategies to make the software easily
accessible. At least frequent subscription should not be there. This may de-motivate
industries from tending to use it.

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