Standard Work
The baseline every improvement project needs, and the training document that replaces pointing. Standard work is the documented current best method: sequence, timing, quality and safety points. Without it, every operator does the job a slightly different way, and there is no baseline to improve from.
What Standard Work Is (and Isn't)
A floor document, not a procedure.
Standard work and a procedure are not the same thing. A procedure describes what must happen. Standard work describes how the best operator currently does it: the sequence, the timing, and the safety and quality points built into the method itself.
A procedure belongs in a quality system. It is written by engineers, reviewed by compliance, and stored in a document control system. Standard work belongs at the workstation. It is written with the operator who does the job best, verified at the actual pace of production, and updated by the people doing the work when a better method is found. Where document control applies, as in regulated and clinical settings, standard work still goes through it. What stays different is who writes it and who proposes the changes: the people doing the job.
Standard work is also not a ceiling. It is a floor. It represents the current best-known method, which means every improvement project is measured against it, and when a better method is confirmed, standard work is updated. A standard work sheet that hasn't changed in three years is either perfect or abandoned.
The 3 Elements
Sequence, time, and WIP. All three, always.
Standard work has three required elements. A document that captures only the sequence is a job aid. One that adds timing but not WIP cannot tell you whether the process is in control. All three together make a standard work sheet.
The Standard Work Sheet
What goes on it vs. what doesn't
A standard work sheet is a visual document, ideally readable at a glance from the workstation. The test: can the operator verify their own compliance without reading a paragraph?
- Work sequence: numbered steps, one verb each
- Cycle time and takt time: visible comparison
- Standard WIP: locations and quantities marked on the layout diagram
- Quality check points: what to verify and when
- Safety points: PPE required, hazard locations, stop conditions
- Operator movement pattern: drawn on the cell layout
- Revision date and who verified it
- How to set up the equipment: that's a changeover procedure
- Troubleshooting steps: that's a job aid or escalation guide
- Explanations of why steps are in the sequence they're in
- Engineering tolerances and specifications: too much detail for a floor doc
- Approvals and sign-off blocks from a document control system
- Any content that makes the sheet longer than one page
How the Skill Builds It
Describe the job. Verify against takt.
Walk through the job step by step, either by describing it in prose or by pasting existing notes or a draft procedure. The skill does not require structured input to start; it builds structure from what you give it.
The skill extracts the work steps, names them with single-verb phrases, and sequences them in the order described. Steps that look like they belong in the sequence but were not described get a [NEEDS GEMBA] placeholder rather than a guess.
Observed cycle times are entered step by step. If you have a takt time, the skill shows the cycle time vs. takt comparison immediately. Unobserved steps are flagged for the stopwatch, because standard work built from estimates is not standard work.
Quality check points (what to verify and when in the sequence) and safety points (PPE, hazards, stop conditions) are added to the steps where they apply, not as a separate section, but embedded in the sequence where the operator will encounter them.
The final document shows cycle time vs. takt with a visual bar and calls out any step that exceeds its time allocation. Standard WIP is counted at the workstation, including units in machines, and written down even when it is one. The skill confirms what still needs a stopwatch before signing off.
Examples
Works for manual assembly and clinical procedures
A seven-step wire harness assembly job, described by the lead operator in a 20-minute walkthrough session. Takt time was known (42 seconds). Observed cycle times for 5 of 7 steps. The skill produced the standard work sheet with two [NEEDS GEMBA] placeholders for the two untimed steps, and flagged that the total observed time was 38 seconds. That is within takt, but with limited margin before adding the two remaining steps.
Five steps timed, two pending. Subtotal: 38 s vs. 42 s takt. Quality check at step 3 (connector polarity). Safety point at step 6 (strain relief clip: pinch hazard). Standard WIP: 1 unit in process.
IV line setup for a nursing unit, a procedure that varied significantly between nurses despite an existing SOP. The skill built standard work from a verbal walkthrough with the charge nurse, then identified where the existing SOP diverged from what the best nurses actually did. The standard work sheet became the basis for a unit-level training update.
In clinical standard work, safety points are mandatory for any step that involves a sharp, a medication, or patient identification. The skill is written to include a two-patient-identifier check wherever one is required. Confirm it against your own policy.
What you get
A real run on the sample data
Unedited output. The sample message at the top went to Claude Sonnet 4.6 (an earlier-generation model, so a newer one may word things differently) with this skill pasted in, the same way the steps below show, on September 29, 2026. Scroll inside the frame to read the whole reply.
Installation
Describe the job. Get the sheet.
resources/examples folder.Related Skills