Best Practices: workplacelean

2/4/2008 - Best Practices: workplacelean
In our competitive world, all organizations are working to stay viable.   Smart organizations are using Lean to drive out the wastes that are inherent in all our systems and processes. 
Ask yourself how much time is lost…
·        searching, deciphering, correcting, or waiting for information? 
·        clarifying incomplete and unusable information? 
·        doing rework because errors are not caught? 
·        entering and copying information because departments use it in different ways? 
·        delaying work because a signature or approval is needed? 
·        making extra copies that are never used or required?
·        chatting along the way to the fax or copier and missing customer calls?   
·        working in a disorganized office space? 
 
All of these wastes cost your organization money – in time, resources, space and employee frustration yet often do not add value to your product or service from the customer’s viewpoint.  In reviewing work processes, ask, “Are customers willing to pay for this?”  
 
Over the last 10 years, many manufacturers, pressured by their customers, have successfully worked to Lean their operations to provide consistent high quality products at a reduced cost with improved delivery times.  Needed improvements on the shop floor are easy to see but the waste in the flow of information in the office is often less visible.   The same Lean concepts and tools that have beensuccessful on the shop floor are being modified to work in both office and healthcare settings.   
 
Statistics show the percentage of waste in office processes is over 80%. How much more competitive, innovative and profitable could you be by redirecting your employees’ efforts to more value added activities?   The pay off is better service to your customers and the opportunity to become more profitable. 
 workplacelean™ are products and services designed and delivered by the Community Colleges of Iowa bringing the power of Lean to office processes and transactions.  For information contact:  Collette Saylor, One Source Training Iowa, a division of the Iowa Association of Community College Trustees, at www.onesourcetrainingiowa.org
Collette Saylor, Executive Director, One Source Training Iowa, Des Moines
Des Moines Register, Saturday, March 24, 2007