Below you will find a real example of a simple WTTT for the Preventative Maintenance on a lathe machine.

A Walk-Through / Talk-Through (WTTT) is a simple technique that breaks the task into steps and discusses what makes each step difficult.

In the first column, are the steps copied verbatim from the maintenance procedure.

In the second column, we see the potential consequences if the step is misperformed.

In the third column, we see examples of constraints and varying conditions. Let’s now focus on step 3.

The step is the check if the machine’s air pressure is 85PSI, because an incorrect amount of pressure may damage the equipment. By talking to an operator, we realized that the gauge shows the pressure in MegaPascals (MP). This means that the same pressure would be expressed with different numbers when using PSI and MP. This could confuse the operator and lead to a mistake.

Finally, we take the findings and discuss with the operator how to best address them. So an easy fix for step 3 is to update the procedure and use MP to make it consistent with the pressure units used in the machine.

Check out the WTTT template I co-designed for the Human Performance Oil and Gas (HPOG): https://www.hpog.org/resource-centre/wttt