By Audrey Thomas

Waste of Inventory, as defined by the Toyota Production System, is easier to spot in a manufacturing setting than in an office. Be assured, though, its there! Waste in a plant is usually quite visible. On the surface its easy to see raw materials and resources that arent being used . Piles of sheet metal and other parts sitting around are easy to spot too. But in an office, waste can be a little trickier to see and identify.

1. Processes – Think about the number of signatures required to get an initiative approved and in place in your company. How long does the paperwork sit in someones office? Sometimes a bottleneck occurs which keeps things from moving forward. If this is the case, can a few signatures be removed from the layers presently required? Setting egos aside and putting the customer first will allow for processes to be streamlined.

2. Customer orders – Once someone places an order with your company, how long do they wait until its fulfilled and shipped? This represents another process that needs to be studied and evaluated on a regular basis to make sure that the customers needs are being met.

3. Paper – Paper represents one of the most common wastes in an office. Are you hanging on to items because youre not sure whether or not they need to be saved? Reviewing your companys retention policies will give you the freedom to either keep or throw the paper that surrounds you. Start today and start out small. Each day moving forward give yourself 10 minutes to open a drawer, remove 2 of papers/files and see how much can be released. You will probably be amazed at what can be released as well as the amount of drawer space you gain.

4. Some years ago I was consulting with a senior level manager at a local hospital. She had 20 filing drawers in her small office. Thats 4 five-drawer filing cabinets. After sorting and purging the contents, she was left with 5 drawers of records which she was required to keep. 15 drawers of papers were shredded and recycled. And once the three empty filing cabinets were removed, it looked like an entirely new office with enough space to add a small table and chairs.

5. Office Supplies Having too many office supplies isnt as easy to spot as youd think. Sometimes people become mini hoarders in keeping their favorite pens and sticky notes tucked away. I confess. I love office supplies. And based on what Ive observed in others offices, Im not alone. What if your employer declared a moratorium on the purchasing of supplies? Would you freak out? I know of a company who did just this. It took nearly six months for the employees to completely use up the supplies that were tucked into the recesses of the company. To avoid this Waste of Inventory, designate one person in each department to oversee the purchasing and maintenance of office supplies.

6. Time – Its something we all have equal shares of yet sometimes we feel as if were being shorted on our daily allotment of 24 hours. Identifying wasted time is hard to do because we dont always want to admit that were wasteful in this area. AT the office, do you spend too much time in meetings or being interrupted by others? How about the amount of time spent reading and processing emails? If youre checking email more than 3-4x a day, youve got room for improvement. Using a time log sheet or software will help you be more realistic in understanding where your time is being spent and see where adjustments need to be made.

Discovering wasteful areas in and around your office will hopefully motivate you to remove that waste and replace it with more efficient systems and processes.

About the Author: Audrey Thomas is a Minneapolis-based speaker, author, and Lean Office expert. Her most popular presentations are Entangled in E-mail, Getting Organized with MS Outlook and Introduction to Lean Office. Thomas serves as the Past-President of the National Speakers Association-Minnesota. She can be reached at Audrey@OrganizedAudrey.com 1-866-767-0455. For more information go to: www.OrganizedAudrey.com or

LeanOffices.com

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