Controlling filled out "forms" (eg Operator job specific work instructions)

[toucan]

I have recently started with a young company that is moving toward TS. In my old company I controlled both the "form" or template that gets populated with job specific info as well as controlled the populated form. I am not talking about a quality record here. As an example, we had our operator job specific work instructions. They all followed a specific format, which I'll call a form. The form had its own document id, rev level, and date. The populated version of the form which was specific to a part was also controlled in the same manner. So I had the form perhaps as F0010 and the populated version as WI1234 (job 1234). Both were controlled.

This is how I was originally going to proceed at my new employer. However, we hired a temp technical writer that was questioning why I would need to do that. He suggested that we would control the populated version of the form with its own number and not bother controlling the form/template. Since the part numbering here is very long I found myself thinking....why not? Is this okay/enough? He is not familiar with TS so I don't want to just run with it.

Thanks in advance for your help!

[Jim Wynne]

In Reply to Parent Post by toucan

I have recently started with a young company that is moving toward TS. In my old company I controlled both the "form" or template that gets populated with job specific info as well as controlled the populated form. I am not talking about a quality record here. As an example, we had our operator job specific work instructions. They all followed a specific format, which I'll call a form. The form had its own document id, rev level, and date. The populated version of the form which was specific to a part was also controlled in the same manner. So I had the form perhaps as F0010 and the populated version as WI1234 (job 1234). Both were controlled.

This is how I was originally going to proceed at my new employer. However, we hired a temp technical writer that was questioning why I would need to do that. He suggested that we would control the populated version of the form with its own number and not bother controlling the form/template. Since the part numbering here is very long I found myself thinking....why not? Is this okay/enough? He is not familiar with TS so I don't want to just run with it.

Thanks in advance for your help!

It sounds like what you're describing would be better identified as a template (a type of form). In your documentation you can describe the required format and contents of work instructions, and then provide (as a convenience) a template that may be used. The template doesn't have to be controlled--the controlling factor is the document that describes the required format and contents.

[E Wall]

Morning Toucan,

Standardizing the template for core work instructions, IMHO, is critical to ensure core information is covered. Having the felxibility to delete or indicate NA for something that is not relevant to a specific job may be needed depending on how detailed your format is.

Additionally, providing uniform formatting provides clear professional looking documentation that is typically much easier to follow whether you are new to the organization or a 20 yr employee. One would assume that your workers will and have changed jobs and knowing what to expect and where to find the core information pertaining to their job can be very reassuring for them and the supervisor/mgmt staff. I bet your HR folks will have some feedback and input to this as well.

How you choose to control the blank template will depend largely on how many individuals are using it. Is someone reviewing to ensure content remains standard? Other considerations: how often does it change? are keeping track of the changes relevant to your process? There are more but I'm sure you get the drift.

We use standard formatting, but as they are used by very few and all documents go thru me, my templates are all set up just by title and a v1, v2 etc, with the obsolete being kept as history for reference.

Good luck going forward,
Eileen

[toucan]

Thank you to the both of you! I am going to use standard templates (as a convenience) and just control the format and content of the documents in my document control work instruction (at least that is my plan today )