Conversion for the production of factories for protective materials possible thanks to Husmuttern's crowd development

When the pandemic came, there was a rapid shortage of protective materials. Thanks to the concept developed by Husmuttern, they were able to offer complete factories for the production of protective materials with ready-made instructions. The instructions and concept are designed in easy-to-manufacture modules; It's cheap and almost anyone can work in the system.

Husmuttern was created because I wanted to do something that was good for society. It was in the middle of a 40-year crisis and I realized that I wanted to do something that is still there when I don't exist. If you're going to make a difference for society as a whole, you have to do something that's missing from society - that's what I thought. What I came up with was entry-level jobs for those who didn't have jobs and housing for those who didn't have housing. If these problems are combined so that anyone can build a house, it should reasonably make a difference. Several years later, thanks to the developed concept, which is based on animated films and pictograms, we were able to deliver complete factories for manufacturing protective materials during the pandemic at a few days' notice. Without the work with the Husmuttern, we would never have been able to do it. We had never even come up with the idea. It's the lessons we've learned through Husmuttern's simple job and the methodology of "anyone should be able to build a house" that made it possible for us to build a portable factory with volunteer staff.

A fair company is a company that works to do good while helping people in society and at the company. In a normal workplace, an entry-level job, a job for people who are far from work, usually means a specially adapted service. But at Husmuttern, everyone works in the same methodology. It creates a very special culture and a very nice community. Our motto is: "Be good, do good, fair deals". It's about wanting to do good for society, for example by having sustainable, circular and good products. We want a good work culture, good ergonomics and a workplace where we are nice to each other, and we want it to be affordable. It also means that we create benefits for society by creating housing that most people can afford, that is of good quality with subcontractors who also share our values. It should be fair!

The work started with the development of workstations and then it was tested with people who were far away from work. Our on-going evaluation researcher at RISE/Chalmers Martin Kurdve challenged us by saying "How can you verify that it works for everyone?". Then we had to continue testing and challenging the concept. The solution to making it work for as many people as possible is that we tested it for the hearing impaired. We have also tested this with other disabilities. We tested our way forward to finally be able to say: yes, it works for most people.

We have been working with something we call crowd development, which has helped us move forward faster. Crowd development means that many people work towards a common goal. Over the years, we have had over 160 students who have done student projects or degree projects with us. This has resulted in over 40 published works and the students have chosen what they want to work with. Here my idea was to offer the students an interesting degree project: "If you have a task that you think is fun and interesting, it will be a good result." We have therefore had very committed students who, after their school work, have had the opportunity to tell future employers that they have done a tailor-made degree project in something they really wanted to do, which makes them more attractive to an employer. It was a very good way for them to get the right first job. We therefore got an absolutely fantastic result. Over the years, for example, we have tested various symbols to guide the installation. It hasn't happened by itself. Images that we initially thought could be used, we realized after tests were not at all suitable. Through all these lines of errors and mistakes, we have been able to set up clear job descriptions for new degree projects, but also eliminate errors in a unique way. We could definitely have learned all this without the degree projects, but it would have taken a lot longer and cost a lot of money. The concept works very well for simpler assembly.

Digitization is an enabler for being able to present animated, moving instructions. When I was a kid, there were comics made with photos combined into movies, but it had taken too long. When developing instructions for the concept, we tested drawn instructions. But when we compared our concept of moving instructions to it, our method was faster and easier to understand. It wasn't efficient because it took too long to understand the steps when they were drawn. It would not have been possible to produce instructions without making them digital. Digitization has therefore helped us to minimize errors and develop instructions that anyone can follow. In addition, with digitization, we can loop, change and update instructions remotely. I am convinced that it would not have been possible without digitalisation.

Right now we are working on a project for Ukraine. We want to develop an instructional concept that is easy to manufacture, ship, is relatively inexpensive and where it is relatively easy to make late changes. We have simplified all our constructions and we want to be able to show that anyone should be able to build a house, even with incredibly limited resources.

Read more about crisis preparedness and continuity management, kontinuitetshantering (via Johan's other company EQPack)

Read more about Husmuttern: Husmuttern – Be good, Do good, fair deals

Read more about the concept via English article (engelsk artikel) or report (rapport).