I want to live in I.E. world

toonertoo

Most Awesome Dog
Staff member
I have always been told that we get 3 minutes per COD for a time allowance.

The first clue that this was going to be an issue is when they reached for the phone. At that point I would have left the COD information and offered to come back later that afternoon for the check. Obviously I don't know your route and don't know if that would have been an option but you were right in that you were basically wasting your time standing there waiting for them to make a decision.
That was actually it, I was trying to tell them I will be buzzing back here in a few hrs for pickups, but they insisted I just stand there and didnt want to hear me. And it irks me my boss took their word over mine. Duh, every single other person thought it was funny as the last thing I have ever been in my life is rude intentionally. I was with a customer when I returned the call. They got a chuckle. I deep down still have a soul and dont like being called what I was. So I have a consensus of 1 thats all I need. Thanks for saving my weekend!
 

tieguy

Banned
In the real world...it doesnt work that way.

there is another real world out there. Its the one that includes GM. I would think GM and the taxpayers wish they had a ups style IE department at GM.

I'm happy that we have our IE department and that they have done their job welll enough to allow sober to continue to be able to bitch about his job.:happy-very:
 

tieguy

Banned
The I.E. (Industrial Engineering) folks who call the shots and make the decisions at UPS come from their own special world that is...a bit different from the one that the rest of us live in. I want to live there too. Here is why.

In IE world...it never rains and you never have to take time to fit a package into a DR bag or find a place where it will stay dry.

In IE world it is a constant 72 degrees. It never snows and there is never any ice to scape off of your windows or to slip and fall on. Your mirrors never freeze. You never need tire chains.

In IE world it never gets dark so you dont need a flashlight. you never have to take extra time trying to see the number on a house.

In IE world there are never any delays due to road construction, accidents or traffic jams. All lights stay green for you 24/7.

In IE world when you pull up next to a house and honk your horn, the 85 yr old bedridden customer comes running out to meet you for their signature required medication.

In IE world, all loads are perfect. You do one bulk stop, then start on shelf one and work your way to your last stop on shelf 8. There are no cuts or splits and you never have to break trace for a business or a misload.

In IE world, PAS and EDD are stop-for-stop perfect and you will complete your entire route without ever making a left turn.

In IE world there is never any late air, so you never have to break trace to meet an air shuttle driver.

In IE world the only packages you deliver are envelopes or nice, square boxes that fit on the shelf or stack neatly on the floor. They are never broken and they never leak. They are balanced to fit perfectly on a hand cart. There are no buckets, or tires, or car axles that weigh 100 lbs and roll around on the floor.

In IE world, it takes the same amount of time to deliver a route out of a new P-700 as it does to deliver it out of a 25 yr old P-800 that cant pull a hill in 3rd gear and that has the turning radius of an aircraft carrier with no power steering.

In IE world when you arrive to do a pickup, the customer is always ready for you. They have printed the end of day report, the NDA volume is kept seperate, and all the international volume is ready to go with invoices and paperwork completed.

In IE world if you follow every method to a "T", work safely, and take your lunch and breaks...you will never be overallowed.


Its a beautiful place, this IE world. I hope I'm lucky enough to live there some day.

images



sorry couldn't resist:happy-very:
 

Dustyroads

Well-Known Member
What the tie fails to understand is that it isn't the folks in IE who are establishing time standards that has made UPS successful, as opposed to the folks running General Motors. What has made UPS successful is the boys (and girls) in brown, out there hustling, running their ass off every day, not because some guy at a computer terminal has set a standard, but because they want a life with their family, some time of their own after work.

I've done this for 30 years, on the same area. I've seen the standards change, I've seen managers play around with the routes to make the number work better. I've worked as hard as I can go, every day, for thirty years. I push it every day. There have been times I've been a hero and times I've been a zero when judged by the operation reports. Funny thing, I've worked the same pace, using the same methods every day. The single biggest factor that has affected my performance has been the quality of the vehicle which I've been assigned. No kidding. And, that factor cannot even be measured by the good folks in IE.

I'm not saying the department is poor at it's job. Nor am I saying that it is not highly respected by others in the industry doing the same job. But, I'm saying that tomorrow morning, if the company announced that they were going to eliminate the IE department completely and outsource it to two guys in Southeast Asia, our life in our centers would go on pretty much the same. And, we'd all go out there and bust our ass tomorrow and go home and enjoy our lives.
 

helenofcalifornia

Well-Known Member
Hey, where is the inspirational quote at the side of each page? I miss my daily inspiration! Now I will have to read that book I got one year for Christmas.
 
Okay....

How about the Institute for Industrial Engineering
How about the Institute for Operations Research and Management Science
How about the countless companies that have benchmarked UPS' engineering group to see how to improve theirs.
How about Thomas Friedman in his Chapter on UPS in the book "The world is Flat"

In addition, Under Industrial Engineering is Plant Engineering and Automotive Engineering. P.E. built Worldport which has been deemed a marvel.

Am I brainwashed or are all these sources? Or maybe you are biased.

P-Man

Don`t forget the bronze medal from High School A.V. Club and Nerd Quarterly magazine.
 

pretzel_man

Well-Known Member
I'm not biased. Been a driver 32 yrs, and have listened to many many managers including a division mgr wine about how I.E. doesn't have a clue!

You asked a question about who recognizes I.E. I think I answered that.

If you said that other managers complain about I.E., I would have agreed.

Also however,

Managers complain that operators don't have a clue.
That BD doesn't have a clue.
IS doesn't have a clue.
etc, etc.

I think there are very few functions that don't get complained about.

P-Man
 

Catatonic

Nine Lives
I'm not biased. Been a driver 32 yrs, and have listened to many many managers including a division mgr wine about how I.E. doesn't have a clue!
I guess you did not hear them complain to I.E. that the drivers didn't have a clue.
The following is not directed at you but everyone:
Nobody has a clue but me (and the person(s) I'm talking to.)
 

tourists24

Well-Known Member
Okay....

How about the Institute for Industrial Engineering
How about the Institute for Operations Research and Management Science
How about the countless companies that have benchmarked UPS' engineering group to see how to improve theirs.
How about Thomas Friedman in his Chapter on UPS in the book "The world is Flat"

In addition, Under Industrial Engineering is Plant Engineering and Automotive Engineering. P.E. built Worldport which has been deemed a marvel.

Am I brainwashed or are all these sources? Or maybe you are biased.

P-Man
I dont see UPS drivers on that list....
 

tieguy

Banned
What the tie fails to understand is that it isn't the folks in IE who are establishing time standards that has made UPS successful, as opposed to the folks running General Motors. What has made UPS successful is the boys (and girls) in brown, out there hustling, running their ass off every day, not because some guy at a computer terminal has set a standard, but because they want a life with their family, some time of their own after work.

The tie does not fail to understand what an awesome job our drivers do. The tie fully understands and appreciates what a fine job the drivers do.

The tie also understands that if your thirty car center suddenly ran a hundred drivers and a hundred package cars for the same volume then ups would soon follow GM to the bankruptcy line.

You can argue with the standards theirselves but the IE folks are a necesaray evil in running a succesfull business.

Jim casey was a believer in work measurement and work standards. His bringing that into his business model is the reason you and I have a job with UPS today.
 
For I.E to implement progressive ideas and technology is one thing. But instead of being a piece of the UPS puzzle they are treated as if they are the burning bush,the end all be all of guiding decisions. And therein lies the problem.
 

upsman68

Well-Known Member
There are no allowances made for everything you mention. That does not mean that your last statement is true.

Time studies are worked up initially based on "expected conditions". Not perfect conditions. The "expected conditions do not include the ones you mention, but.... This is an important but...

After the base times are determined, an additional allowance is added. I don't know what its called today, but when I was taught, it was called PDF.

Nearly 30 years ago I went to school at UPS to learn how to do original time studies. This is different than the ones I.E.'s do when they study you. A select few people were sent to school and we got a coveted "blue card" that enabled us to work up and original analysis.

The last step of working up a study was to add in PDF. It used to be 15%. It was meant to account for many of the things not accounted for. PDF stands for Personal, Delay, and Fatigue.

So, its not true that perfect conditions are expected. Its not true that no delays are accounted for.

Also, as I have said before, work measurement is NOT meant to measure an individual driver for an individual day. PDF may be too little for you, and too much for a different driver.

P-Man

I would like to see you get on a truck and deliver a load with not so perfect conditions.
 

Dustyroads

Well-Known Member
My center manager is bright enough not to use 100 drivers when he only needs 30. More importantly, my center manager knows better than anyone in IE how many drivers he needs, any day, every day. He doesn't need some guy who never delivered a package in his life telling him how to run his day to day operations. Sorry, tie guy, that you don't have that kind of confidence in center managers you know.
 

MC4YOU2

Wherever I see Trump, it smells like he's Putin.
I have always been told that we get 3 minutes per COD for a time allowance.

The first clue that this was going to be an issue is when they reached for the phone. At that point I would have left the COD information and offered to come back later that afternoon for the check. Obviously I don't know your route and don't know if that would have been an option but you were right in that you were basically wasting your time standing there waiting for them to make a decision.

Another option, although it goes against our ingrained instinct as hustling hurriers, is to consider how often this will repeat itself at this location. Like Tonner said, once in ten years? I usually have found if you can get through to them before you leave that UPS won't let you wait, after you have given them ample time (5 min max?), you will not likely have to deal with the same customer & situation again anytime soon. If you can't communicate this, you might as well consider that you will have to deal with them on their terms next time. It's a tough call I admit, but I have customers that are slower than that, that insist on using qwikbooks on their computer and looking up po's and the whole nine yards, and they are shippers as well that you are just stuck waiting. Like they they say, we get paid by the hour. That's why cod's are expensive.
 

tieguy

Banned
My center manager is bright enough not to use 100 drivers when he only needs 30. More importantly, my center manager knows better than anyone in IE how many drivers he needs, any day, every day. He doesn't need some guy who never delivered a package in his life telling him how to run his day to day operations. Sorry, tie guy, that you don't have that kind of confidence in center managers you know.

And why is he bright enough to do so. because he has work measurement to help him make that decision.

You're center manager as bright as he may be would not have a job because UPS would not exist without work measurement and peformance standards.

As much as we all complain about IE this company would not exist without their doing what they do. Businesses that do not engage in work measurement and the development of performance standards do not last very long.
 

Dustyroads

Well-Known Member
And, I'm always pretty skeptical of anyone who says the company wouldn't exist without them, especially when they work behind a desk.
 

MC4YOU2

Wherever I see Trump, it smells like he's Putin.
The tie does not fail to understand what an awesome job our drivers do. The tie fully understands and appreciates what a fine job the drivers do.

The tie also understands that if your thirty car center suddenly ran a hundred drivers and a hundred package cars for the same volume then ups would soon follow GM to the bankruptcy line.

You can argue with the standards theirselves but the IE folks are a necesaray evil in running a succesfull business.

Jim casey was a believer in work measurement and work standards. His bringing that into his business model is the reason you and I have a job with UPS today.

That being said, do you feel that Casey would run IE the same way the shareholders do? Do you feel that modern IE and the shareholders have the same consideration for the fine job we do, that you do and Jim Casey did?
 
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