Standardisation

The concept of standardisation is closely connected to the division of labour. To explain this concept, we will look at an example involving someone called Eli Whitney.

Whitney had received a contract to manufacture ten thousand muskets for the American army at the end of the 18th century. To succeed in this task, he used interchangeable parts (components) in the manufacturing of muskets. (Whitney was not the first person to use interchangeable parts in manufacturing. But he helped make the concept popular.)

Whitney created muskets that consisted of five separate parts. Each with around ten different possible component designs but designed in such a way that regardless of design, any part belonging to one of the five categories could be combined with any part from each of the other four categories.

Managing to create components that could be combined without having to customise specific components to match with each other, led to huge advantages into the production process. Significantly reducing the need for customization facilitated mass production.

A summary

Put simply, standardisation means creating common standards to reduce the need of having to spend time and resources on specific solutions within a process.

What are some examples of standardisation that you can think of? Are there cases in which standardisation would not work?

Write your answer in the comment section and discuss your ideas with other learners.