Only Dan knows how to set up the chair jig
Your best-selling chair has a compound angle on the back legs that took months to get right. There is a jig for it, and a set of templates, and a sequence of machine settings. The maker who developed them knows it all. When he is on holiday, chair production stops or goes slowly while someone else works it out again. When he mentions he might move away next year, you realise how much of your workshop's method is in his hands.
Know-how that is never written down
Workshops are practical places. Methods are learned by watching and doing, and refined over time. Writing them down feels like a distraction from making.
- Methods for signature pieces are in makers' heads.
- Jigs and templates are stored wherever there is room, without labels.
- Machine settings for particular operations are rediscovered each time.
- Improvements one maker makes are not shared with others.
- Training a new maker depends on who has time to show them.
What fragile know-how costs
When the person who knows is away, production slows or quality varies. When they leave, some of the workshop's value leaves with them. New makers take longer to become productive. Jigs are rebuilt because the old one cannot be found or nobody knows what it was for. And consistency across pieces, which matters for a range, depends on the same person making every one.
A workshop method library
- For each signature piece, the method is recorded as short steps with photos or brief videos taken on a phone at the bench, by the maker who knows it.
- Machine settings, such as angles, fence positions and cutter heights, are recorded with each step.
- Every jig and template gets a label and a record: what it is for, photos, where it is stored and which methods use it.
- Commissions and range pieces link to their methods, so the maker picking up a job sees the right steps and jigs.
- Makers can suggest improvements to a method, which you approve before the method changes.
- New makers work through methods with the library alongside, and sign off steps as they learn them.
| Knowledge | Today | With the library |
|---|---|---|
| How to make the chair | Ask the one maker | Step by step with photos |
| Where is the jig? | Search the workshop | Location on record |
| Machine settings | Rediscovered | Recorded with the step |
| Improvements | Stay with one person | Shared once approved |
| Training | Whoever has time | Methods to follow and sign off |
We keep recording light. A method is captured once, in the workshop, with a phone, not written up at a desk.
A workshop that does not depend on one person
Anyone trained can make your signature pieces to the same standard. Holidays and departures slow things down less. New makers learn faster and with less of your time. Jigs are found and reused. And your methods, which are a real part of what the business is worth, are protected.
The library also helps with quality. When a piece comes back with a problem, you can check whether the method was followed or whether the method itself needs changing. Improvements are made once and reach everyone, instead of one maker quietly doing it better while another carries on the old way.
Is your know-how at risk?
- Some pieces can only be made by one person.
- Jigs and templates are unlabelled.
- Machine settings are worked out again each time.
- Training depends on who is free.
- Quality varies depending on who made a piece.