Lean Six Sigma Academy

No matter if business is good or bad one thing is for certain… you, and those you work with, should be laser focused on cost reduction.

Now be honest, when you read the words cost reduction was the first thing that popped into your mind reduction in force? You know, laying people off?

Sadly this seems to be the most popular way to reduce costs for a lot of companies. But it doesn’t have to be this way.

There are so many other ways to reduce operating costs. So many one could write a 6 book series on the topic!

But until then, I’d like to propose 3 practical ways you and your organization, no matter the size or number of employees, can reduce costs in the front office.

Let’s get started.

1. Change Default Printing to Black & White

It’s estimated that it costs .08 cents a page to print in color versus .007 cents a page to print in black and white.

So, if we assume a person prints 10 pages a day x 260 workdays… printing in color will cost $208 per year while printing in black and white will cost $18.20 per year for a difference of $189.80.

Take that across a company of 5,000 employees and we’re talking some serious costs savings folks ($949,000).

There are ways to change the “default” print color to black and white on your computer to make this change happen. Your IT department can likely do this remotely, across the board, without employees having to do anything.

2. Text Messaging Plans

Next, if your company pays for associate’s cell phone usage I’d encourage you to check out the text messaging plans.

Some people are text message crazy while others are not. For those who love the text message it makes sense to have them on a plan to accommodate their usage.

But for those who rarely text it may make sense to have them “pay as they go” which can save $10 to $20 per month.

Again, taken across a company of 5,000 employees we’re paying a person’s salary ($100,000).

3. Print on Both Side of Paper

I have worked with clients who “recycled” their paper by printing on both sides.

They had special bins that employees placed their one sided printed documents into. This, printed on one side, paper was then placed in a special printer that everyone was mapped to.

This was their so-called “junk” printer… meaning if you wanted to print out an email or some other document that didn’t warrant a completely clean piece of paper the junk printers were called upon.

Depending on where you buy your paper, 500 sheets can cost up to $10. So, to be sure, this adds up quickly.

What am I missing?

Obviously this is a very short list of 3 things any company can do to save money. There are more posts I have written below in the Related Posts section for some additional ideas.

But I’m curious, what things are you and your organization doing to save administrative money besides, gulp, the lay-off approach?

On Monday I wrote a fun little article asking the fine readers of LSS Academy if they could count! Of course this was all done in fun… as I know you can all count.

But, as many of you pointed out, there were several lessons to be learned from this exercise.

Bad Instructions

It took awhile but my friend, and business partner, Jon Miller rightly pointed out that my “instructions” we poor at best.

You see, I mentioned “the next paragraph” but then the next paragraph was a sentence that contained no F’s at all. Or is it Fs? Jon always corrects me and my other business partner, Kevin, on the use of the apostrophe… but I digress!

The lesson to be learned is to make sure any and all instructions are crystal clear and leave no room for misunderstanding.

Loose Measurement Systems

Now, for those of you that focused on the large paragraph… well, how can I say this nicely? Some of you did better than others!

Truth be told I have done this experiment hundreds of times and before I posted the article I counted and got 27! So, yeah, I stink at counting too!

The trick, as many pointed out, is that for some reason we often miss the word “of” and thus totally screw up the count.

The lesson to be learned is it is very easy for humans to make mistakes. It doesn’t matter how educated you are and how careful you’re being… visual inspection of any kind is darn hard.

Error Proofing

So, perhaps, the best solution for difficult tasks like this is to use some form of error proofing… removing, or at least minimizing, the chance of human error.

Shaunak wins the prize for the most, um, creative idea with his idea of using Excel and a little formula. See his comment below if you’d like to give it a try.

Or, if you’re a bit simpler minded, like me, you could copy the text into MS Word and use the “Find and Replace” function and simply search for f.

When you do this you’ll quickly learn that F is used 36 times in this paragraph!

The lesson to be learned is to always seek a form of error proofing when the chance of human error is high.  You don’t always have to use technology to accomplish this but is some cases, it might help.

What do you think?

Were you surprised at how hard it was to count the F’s? If so, can you imagine how many mistakes are made each and every day as humans, who will make mistakes, visually inspect all sort of things? Scary isn’t it?

If you’ve ever gone through some form of continuous improvement training you may have done this little experiment.

But in case you haven’t, I’d like to challenge you to count the number of times the letter “F” (upper or lower case) is used in the following paragraph.

Post your guess, I mean answer, in comments section.  Ready?  Go!

The necessity of training farm hands for first class farms in the fatherly handling of farm live stock is foremost in the eyes of farm owners. Since the forefathers of the farm owners trained the farm hands for first class farms in the fatherly handling of farm livestock, the farm owners feel they should carry on with the family tradition of training farm hands of first class farmers in the fatherly handling of farm live stock because they believe it is the basis of good fundamental farm management.

I recently came across the video below and was intrigued by many aspects of this “rolling tool cart.”

Here are some of the things I liked.

• It was made for around $50 according to this article.
• It’s on wheels
• It can be moved to point of use eliminating motion
• It seems to be relatively safe to use
• It doesn’t take up much space

Here are some things I think could be improved.

• Do we really need that many tools on one cart or should we only focus on the tools we use most?
• If something was missing would we know?
• While labels are not everything… I’d at least like to see the drawers labeled.

What do you think?

What do you think of this?  Thumbs up or thumbs down?

I don’t pretend to be an “economic guru” by any means… honestly it all makes my head hurt a bit.

I did, however, thoroughly enjoy reading Bill Waddell’s thoughts on the state of manufacturing in America – and really the West in general.

Bill, for those that don’t know, may have forgotten more about manufacturing than many of us will ever know.  He also writes over at Evolving Excellence and is, um, passionate.  Yeah, passionate is a good word.

I’ll also warn you ahead of time, Bill is an opinionated fellow… but seems to have a tremendous amount of wisdom that I, for one, have personally learned from.

If you’d like to download and read Bill’s rant, I mean thoughts, visit his website and download the Word document titled “The Hollow American Economy.”

After you read – or at least skim the paper – I’d be interested in your thoughts.  Specifically, do you agree with Bill?  Or do you think he may be missing the mark?

Here is part one of our first Gemba Academy video. To see the complete and full screen version – in high definition – please visit our main site. Stay tuned for more free videos in the coming weeks.

Note: This is the 400th article here on LSS Academy! I’ll take some time to reflect on this in the near future. But for now, I have a far more important topic to discuss. Read on.

Times are tough. Real tough. You may have recently lost your job. You may be worried about losing your job. You may be worried about making payroll this month. No matter the situation you’re in… chance are… things have been a lot better than they are now.

What to do? I’ll tell you exactly what I think you should do. Invest. Yep, that’s right. You and I need to invest like never before.

And before you think I’m crazy I am not proposing you invest in the stock market, housing market, or anything like that.

Nope. I am talking about investing in two particular things – yourself and your company.

Invest in Yourself

Let’s begin with you. Here are some tips for how you can invest in yourself.

• Make something happen. You have the knowledge. You have the will. Now it’s time to do something with these attributes. Go to your gemba – or the place the work is done – and attack the waste that’s devouring your company. It’s there. I promise. Find it… then kill it.
• Learn something new. I don’t care what it is. Learn something new and learn it this week. Need help? Click here.
• Help others. I assure you someone has it worse off than you. Find them and help them. You’ll help yourself more than you know.
• Stop worrying. Lastly, worrying is natural. It’s also detrimental to success. So try to stop worrying and instead start focusing on the three points above.

Invest in Your Company

Now that we have you taken care of let’s switch gears and talk about how you can invest in your company.

• Run a kaizen. Find something to improve. Assemble a team. And hit it. And hit it hard. Then when you’re done – repeat.
• Light the fire. Ever heard of the burning platform? Now is the time to light a few while pouring gasoline all over them (metaphorically speaking of course).
• Ask how you can help. Not sure what you can do to help your company? Ask someone. If they don’t know ask someone else.

What about You?

Do you agree with this advice? If so, why? If not, why? Do you have anything to add to the ideas above?

Subscribe to LSS Academy

To keep track of what we’re up to here on LSS Academy please consider subscribing to our full feed RSS. You can also subscribe by email and have new articles sent directly to your inbox.  Finally, you can follow us on Twitter along with a number of other lean and six sigma bloggers.

I’ve recently been involved with a SMED (single minute exchange of dies) kaizen event. The event itself was extremely effective and tons of fun… and while I could share the specifics of the event with you I won’t.

Instead, I want to focus on one particular part of the kaizen that I feel greatly attributed to our success – the video taping process.

Specifically I want to share some tips that may help you out if you decide to use video in the future.

1. Get Permission

First of all, before you even think about rolling video on someone… be sure to get their permission and their manager’s permission.

In some cases it’s probably not a bad idea to let human resources know as well. If you work in a union environment or in certain parts of the world video taping may or may not be allowed.

2. Talk to the Operator and Explain What You’re Doing

Next, once you have permission you need to spend some quality time with the “talent” meaning the person you plan to tape.

During this time you must explain why you are taping them, how the footage will be used, and how you are not out to catch them making a mistake.

In many cases an operator will feel a tremendous amount of anxiety when being video taped so please take the time to put their mind at ease.

3. Go to Gemba

Now, there are a few ways to go about recording the video. You can set the camera up in such a way as to see the entire process. This method probably helps relieve the stress of the operator a little.

The downside to this approach is you are often limiting yourself as to what you can see. For example, it may be nice to zoom in once in awhile. Also, if you are watching a process like a CNC lathe it may be difficult to capture everything from far away (I learned this the hard way).

With this said, I am personally a fan of getting as close as possible while not being in the way to record footage.

4. Have their Colleague Run the Camera

Another tip that has worked well for me is to ask one of the operator’s colleagues, preferably someone they really like, to operate the camera. This helps relieve anxiety and can even make the process fun for all involved.

Further, the “friend” may be quite familiar with the process being recorded in which case they can offer a small narration as to what is happening. This makes the analysis of the video tape much easier.

5. Involve the Operator in Analysis

Finally, it is absolutely critical to include the operator in the analysis of the video tape. The main reason is they are the best person to help you identify the various “elements” of the process. Also, they’ll likely have the best ideas for improving the process once you have taught them the basic principles of SMED.

What about you?

These are just a few tips I’ve learned… what video taping tips do you have?

Subscribe to LSS Academy

To keep track of what we’re up to here on LSS Academy please consider subscribing to our full feed RSS. You can also subscribe by email and have new articles sent directly to your inbox.  Finally, you can follow us on Twitter along with a number of other lean and six sigma bloggers.

(electric guitar plays)

Alright!

Scanning the scene
in the city tonight
We’re looking for you
to start up a fight
There’s an evil feeling in our brains
But it’s nothing new
you know it drives us insane.

Back in the Day

Ah yes, for some of you these lyrics likely bring back some memories. They do for me. You see, as a young man I was, how should I say, far more rebellious and wild than I am today. And believe it or not… I used to belt out these very lyrics as the lead singer of my heavy medal rock band – crazy hair, earring and all. I’m dead serious.

Seek and Destroy Muda

For those that aren’t aware the song lyrics above are from the song “Seek and Destroy” by Metallica.

I actually heard this song a few days ago and got to thinking that while I’m pretty sure James and the boys never meant for this little ballad to describe how we lean and six sigma folks should set off to attack things like muda (waste)… it actually does the job well.

I mean we should always be looking to pick a fight with muda – any time, any place.

And while I am not sure evil is the first word I would use to describe the optimal mindset as we go to battle with muda… let’s go with it. I mean if we despise muda, and we should, evil probably works.

And finally, muda is nothing new. People have been battling it for many, many years.  And for some (see Big 3) muda can definitely bring on feelings similar to insanity if not dealt with properly.

Running,
On our way
Hiding,
You will be
Dying,
One thousand deaths
Running,
On our way
Hiding,
You will be
Dying,
One thousand deaths
Searching,
Seek and Destroy
Searching,
Seek and Destroy (MUDA)!

Creating meaningful charts and graphs for safety related issues can be hard, not to mention confusing. It doesn’t have to be. In this article I will share a technique that may help bring some clarity to the situation.

The Wrong Approach

First, let’s assume a company tracks the number of accidents per month. For the sake of an example let’s use this totally fabricated data set:

• Jan-07: 0
• Feb-07: 1
• Mar-07 : 0
• Apr-07: 0
• May-07: 0
• Jun-07: 1
• Jul-07: 1
• Aug-07: 0
• Sep-07: 0
• Oct-07: 0
• Nov-07: 0
• Dec-07: 1
• Jan-08: 0
• Feb-08: 0
• Mar-08 : 0
• May-08: 1
• Jun-08: 0
• Jul-08: 0
• Aug-08: 0
• Sep-08: 1
• Oct-08: 0
• Nov-08: 0
• Dec-08: 1

With this data, some may attempt to create a c chart. When they do they get something that looks sort of like this.

The upper control limit is 1.959 and the measure of central tendency is 0.304. Friends, this graph is pretty much useless. There is really no way of determining if things are getting better, worse, or staying the same.

A Better Approach

A better approach would be to somehow convert this data into a yearly rate. There are a number of formulas you can use to do this… but one I quite like is to simply count the days between accidents and multiply is by 365.

For example, the first accident (in our made up data set) happened on February 8, 2007 and the second accident occurred on June 16, 2007. This means there were 128 days between accidents.

So, our annual accident rate could be calculated as follows: (1 accident/128 days) * (365 days/year) = 2.85 accidents per year.

When we work the math for the rest of the data we see something like this.

• 8-Feb-07, first accident
• 16-Jun-07, 128 days between accidents, rate = 2.85
• 10-Jul-07, 24 days between accidents, rate = 15.21
• 17-Dec-07, 160 days between accidents, rate = 2.28
• 1-May-08, 136 days between accidents, rate = 2.68
• 6-Sep-08, 128 days between accidents, rate = 2.85
• 11-Dec-08, 96 days between accidents, rate = 3.80

Now, by using the rate data we can create an Individuals and Moving Range Chart (I-MR) that looks something like this.

This graph is far more powerful than the c chart. From this I-MR chart we can see that we had a blip early on but have since leveled off.

In other words things are pretty much staying the same. And since we’re talking about the safety of our workers the fact things are moving sideways – averaging around 5 accidents per year – is probably cause for strong action in most companies.

Not the Only Way

As I mentioned, this is not the only way to calculate an annual accident rate. With this said, I would be very interested to hear how your company goes about this.