A Note on Industrial Engineering

Introduction

Industrial engineering is a branch of engineering concerned with the development, improvement, and implementation of integrated systems of people, money, knowledge, information, and equipment in order to optimise complex processes, systems, or organisations. Manufacturing activities rely heavily on industrial engineering. Industrial engineers specify, forecast, and assess the outcomes of systems and processes using specific knowledge and skills from the mathematical, physical, and social sciences, as well as engineering analysis and design principles and methods. Several industrial engineering principles are used in the manufacturing business to ensure that systems, processes, and activities run smoothly.

Description

Lean Manufacturing, Six Sigma, Information Systems, Process Capability, and DMAIC are all examples of this. These concepts enable the development of novel systems, processes, or circumstances for the efficient coordination of labour, materials, and machines, as well as the enhancement of the quality and productivity of physical and social systems. Industrial engineering may overlap with operations research, systems engineering, manufacturing engineering, production engineering, supply chain engineering, management science, management engineering, financial engineering, ergonomics or human factors engineering, safety engineering, logistics engineering, or other sub-specialties, depending on the user's viewpoint or motives.

Historians agree that the roots of the industrial engineering profession may be traced back to the industrial revolution. The flying shuttle, the spinning jenny, and, perhaps most critically, the steam engine helped mechanise conventional manual operations in the textile industry, resulting in economies of scale that made mass production in centralised areas attractive for the first time. The factories built by these developments gave birth to the concept of the production system. It has also been stated that Leonardo da Vinci was the first Industrial Engineer, because there is evidence that, he applied science to the examination of human activity around the year 1500, when he looked at the rate at which a man could shovel soil. Others claim that, Charles Babbage's research of manufacturing operations, notably his work on the creation of straight pins in 1832, spawned the IE profession. However, it has been widely argued that, while valuable, these early efforts were purely observational and did not attempt to engineer the jobs under study or increase overall output. Many of the industrial revolution's technological pioneers were inspired to build and implement factory systems by Adam Smith's principles of division of labour and capitalism's "Invisible Hand," which he articulated in his essay "The Wealth of Nations."

James Watt and Matthew Boulton's work resulted in the world's first integrated machine manufacturing facility, which included concepts such as cost control systems to eliminate waste and boost production, as well as the establishment of skills training for craftsmen. Because of the notions, he proposed in his book "On the Economy of Machinery and Manufacturers," which he authored as a result of his tours to factories in England and the United States in the early 1800s, Charles Babbage became identified with industrial engineering. The book covers topics such as how long it takes to complete a work, the consequences of breaking tasks down into smaller, less complicated pieces, and the benefits of repeating tasks. Eli Whitney and Simeon North demonstrated the viability of interchangeable components in the production of muskets and pistols for the United States government. Individual parts were mass-produced to tolerances that allowed them to be used in any finished product under this technique. The outcome was a major reduction in the requirement for specialist employees' skills, which eventually led to the study of the industrial environment.