By Cynthia Marsh-Croll
During my journey of increasing value to my clients and expanding my skills, I have embarked on a quest for reducing waste in office processes. On this journey I discovered something that is truly amazing – “Lean Office”. Why is this so incredible? Because it addresses the fact “that 60 to 80 percent of all costs associated with meeting a customer demand…is an administrative function” – Value Stream Management for the Lean Office, Don Tapping and Tom Shuker. Why is this significant? By becoming a Lean organization you can produce a better quality product for less and have a competitive edge; and best of all an increased profit margin. Wow all this from eliminating waste.
Lean is a whole system that I could not even attempt to explain implementing in this short article. However, I can give you an overview to decide if Lean is something you should research further.
Lean’s whole premise is to add value to your customer and eliminating waste. The customer is the central focus when determining waste. In fact, when analyzing your workflow, value stream, you begin with the customer and work backwards. As a professional organizer it is my inclination to start from the other end. It takes a bit to wrap your mind around that. But if everything you do revolves around value to the customer then starting with the customer makes complete sense. The traditional thinking for determining the price of a product is cost + profit = price. In a Lean organization it is price – cost = profit. Therefore, price is determined by the market (ergo your customer). The key component to increasing your profits is reducing your cost. I call that a very good incentive for being efficient.
“The office waste may be compartmentalized into four elements – information, process, physical environment and people.” – Flow in the Office, Carlos Venegas. A broken down grid with specific examples of each of these types of waste is available in “Flow in the Office” by Carlos Venegas. The grid gives you indicators to determine if one of these is a problem in your office. When implementing Lean Office is not about picking and choosing but changing the whole way your work and think.
Another powerful element of implementing this system is the involvement of everyone who is part of or affected by the value stream. Coming up with solutions is a team effort. The experts about the work are those people who are performing it everyday. They know what is causing the bottlenecks and frustration with their workflow. The atmosphere is one of discovery not blame. Giving the people on the front lines the ability to do continuous improvements on a process is a great use of resources. There is a continuous flow of information from the bottom to the top and vise versa. Creating an environment of open communication.
The more I learn about Lean Office the more I am amazed at the difference it can make in productivity. I would recommend any management or owner who is unhappy with the overall performance and competitiveness of their business take a look at Lean and see if it would work for your organization.
Cynthia Marsh-Croll Turning Business Piles Into Profits! Croll Organizing, LLC PO Box 98 Westtown, NY 10998 845-649-2778 cmc@crollorganizing.com http://www.crollorganizing.com Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Cynthia_Marsh-Croll
