These wastes have been established as the 7 common wastes within transactional and manufacturing processes worldwide:
Transportation:
Transporting products or paperwork introduces delays, increases costs and wastes energy. Therefore reducing transport can avoid increased overheads whilst reducing wasted time. The more frequently an item is used the closer it should be stored to the point of use. Items that are only used occasionally should be stored at the end of the workbench or in a cupboard. Consumables should be stored close to equipment or processes to minimise travel.
Inventory:
Inventory builds up for many reasons it often Masks processing problems. reducing inventory will save money and increase cash flow. However, be aware that reducing inventory will uncover hidden causes that masked by having excess inventory. Always eliminate the underlying causes of inventory before reducing it, otherwise they could catch you out when no buffer stock available.
Motion:
Think about how you organise your desk if you are left handed, place your phone on the right hand side of your desk so that when you answer the phone you can pick up your pen with your left hand to write dawn any notes. The more frequently you use an item the closer it should be to your work area.
Over processing:
A good example of this is the NASA pen it cost millions to develop a pen that could be used in space in zero gravity. The Russians simply used a pencil. Its a bit like the old saying of “Using a hammer to crack a nut”.
Over production:
Manufacturers often overproduce products this ties up cash and resources reducing available cash to make improvements.
Defects:
There are many causes of defects from poor design through to poor instructions or drawings that could be misinterpreted eliminating the waste of defects can significantly reduce labour and material costs. Typical companies have a cost of poor quality of around 30 percent of the cost of sales. Minimising defects can save a fortune if done in a structured way.
Skills:
In many businesses the employees are often skilled in subjects that their managers know nothing about. Like mathematics or mechanics and software development. There are many successful authors out here who do a day job as well, but their mangers are unaware so they go unnoticed. Its worth sitting down and capturing all of your teams goals, values and aspirations as these often uncover the hidden talents you are looking for. By Ignoring the hidden skills and talents within your teams you could miss on opportunity to develop a star into a money saving genius. By creating a simple skills matrix of the people working for you we can then work with them, quite often they are keen to express their knowledge to assist in solving problems. As the old saying goes “Nobody goes to work to do a bad job so if you give them the opportunity to improve often they will”. If this is not true then they may be causing more harm than good and probably should not be working for you.
Philip Perrin