Crew Evaluation, what is it? According to Webster, “crew” means a group of people working together, and “evaluation” means to find the value or amount of. By putting the two together, it now becomes, the value of a group of working people. In the line clearing industry, this is commonly achieved by taking the time spent trimming trees and dividing it by the number of trees trimmed, which gives us man-hours per tree trimmed. It is this figure and term that are commonly used to express the value of the crew.
But is this crew evaluation? Yes, if the contributions of management and supervision were factored out in figuring the value of the crew’s contribution to the end product of trees trimmed.
To find crew evaluation, the system used should measure factors governed by the crew in determining their value toward the product, while excluding factors contributed to the product by other parts of the organization. If this is not accomplished by some means, the value expressed for the crew is some type of organizational evaluation expressed as the value obtained from one of the organizational components.
It was for this reason a system called CPPE was created to evaluate crews. It stands for Crew Performance Productivity and Effectiveness. In creating the system, it was necessary to identify the crew’s work activities and code them for easy recording, and establish some standard time periods to complete certain types of work.
Some of the work activities and standard time periods used in the system are as follows:
| Code | Distribution Lines |
|---|---|
| 1 | Use when working for or on primary or secondary service drops or street lights. Transmission Lines Use the following codes when working for or on: |
| 2 | 23 kV Transmission Lines |
| 3 | 34.5 kV |
| 4 | 69 kV |
| 5 | 138 kV |
| 6 | 345 kV |
| Code | Use Codes |
|---|---|
| 10 | Trimming trees for or on secondary service drops or street light conductors |
| 11 | Topping or rounding over a tree |
| 12 | Side or through trimming |
| 13 | Trimming a tree that is overhanging the conductor |
| Use the following codes when: | |
| 14 | The tree is under the conductor |
| 15 | The tree is beside the conductor |
| 16 | The tree is overhanging the conductor |
| 17 | The tree is removed and no conductor is involved |
| Code | |
|---|---|
| 71 | Line shop or reporting location time |
| 72 | Travel time |
| 73 | Chip, wood disposal |
| 74 | Called away from scheduled work area |
| 76 | Working on tools |
| 77 | Time lost due to finding a job unworkable |
| 100 | Bucket truck |
| 200 | Rope truck |
| 300 | Spray truck |
| 32 | Tree trimming working foreman |
| 36 | Trimmer A |
| 37 | Trimmer B |
| 38 | Trimmer C |
| 39 | Trimmer D |
| Tree Trimming | ||
|---|---|---|
| Units Code | Hours 100 Crew | Hours 200 Crew |
| 110 | .50 | .80 |
| 111 | 1.60 | 2.00 |
| 112 | 1.00 | 1.30 |
| 113 | 1.30 | 1.20 |
| Tree Removal | ||
| 114 | 1.50 | 2.10 |
| 115 | 1.70 | 2.00 |
| 116 | 4.00 | 5.40 |
| 117 | .60 | .90 |
With these codes, the crew is then instructed to report on a job ticket the work activities they engaged in and the time they spent doing them.
This would show up on job tickets as illustrated in Fig. 1 and Fig. 2. From these job tickets it is now possible to compute the value of a crew and compare their value to other crews and gain some insight on how other parts of the organization may be helping or hindering the crew.
Crew No. 1. job ticket
Crew No. 2. job ticket4) It can show areas where other parts of the organization may be contributing to the crew’s effectiveness or lack of it.
Before we do this, let’s first compute their value under the man-hour per tree trimmed method.
| Crew I | Crew II | |
|---|---|---|
| Men in crew | 2.0 | 2.0 |
| Trees trimmed | 10.0 | 16.0 |
| Man-hours in crew | 16.0 | 16.0 |
| Man-hour/tree trimmed | 1.6 | 1.0 |
Without standard times, the only thing possible is to compare one crew against the other, and what are you comparing? What do you do if you have only one crew? In addition, this situation leaves us explaining the difference by reason that one crew’s trees may be larger, travel time greater, or maybe it had something to do with secondary or primary lines. All or one of the reasons may be true but should not be relied upon unless then can be verified by some means.
By using the CPPE system these reasons are verified by breaking down the time spent on the various work activities in three areas — work-related time, line activity hours, and standard times for units. Let’s look at this more closely.
| Crew I | Crew II | |
|---|---|---|
| Shop time hours | .50 | 2.50 |
| Travel time hours | 3.00 | 2.50 |
| Chip disposal hours | 1.00 | —0— |
| 4.50 | 5.00 |
| Units of work completed | ||
|---|---|---|
| Units of work | Crew I | Crew II |
| 110 | 3 | 12 |
| 111 | 5 | —0— |
| 112 | 1 | 4 |
| 113 | 1 | —0— |
| 10 | 16 | |
| Crew I (hours) | Crew II (hours) | |
|---|---|---|
| Standard time for units | 11.8 | 10.0 |
| Actual time for units | 11.5 | 11.0 |
These figures are then used to find:
Crew performance
Performance = a measure of the amount of work produced while on the iob.
Crew productivity
Performance = a measure of the amount of work produced while on the job.
Crew effectiveness
Effectiveness = a measure of work produced as related to the time available for working.
CREW COMPARISON USING THE TWO SYSTEMS
| Man-hour/tree trimmed CPPE | Crew I 1.60 | Crew II 1.00 |
|---|---|---|
| Performance rate | 102% | 91% |
| Productive rate | 73% | 69% |
| Effectiveness rate | 74% | 63% |
What are the advantages of the CPPE System?
1) The crew is valued on its merits.
2) It verifies how the time was spent.
3) It explains some of the difference between crews and points out what areas may need improvement.
In closing, I shall leave you with one question — can you verify which of your crews is returning to you the value you expected from them?
Footnotes
↵1 Presented at the annual conference of the International Society of Arboriculture in Louisville, Kentucky in August 1982.
- © 1983, International Society of Arboriculture. All rights reserved.
