FITT Facts: Waste #4

Waste #4 - Waiting

Waiting is defined as people waiting for information, material, tools, machines, other people or anything else while a process sits idle.  No value added work is being done.

Waiting is everywhere; it can be found in ANY business that is selling a product or service and it doesn't matter if your company’s model is Business-to-Business or Business-to-Consumer. 

The funny thing about waiting is how much everyone dislikes it, yet so many businesses aren’t actively trying to eliminate it from all their customer’s interactions, internal or external.  Seriously... You don’t like waiting, so why make your customers do it?

Waiting Waste Examples	What to do about it…
An order sitting on a Purchaser’s or Customer Service Rep’s desk waiting for an approval.	Ask why the approval step is there in the first place; usually it’s due to a lack of trust upstream in the process.  Solve the upstream problem.  Define spending/decision levels for teams and individuals (only if the value exceeds X do you need an approval).  Re-prioritize the approvals so they can happen immediately.
Machines sitting idle, waiting for material or supplies to be delivered.	Work with suppliers to deliver product as needed, tied to your production schedule.  Share the production schedule with multiple stakeholders to eliminate the “I didn't know” comment.  Put supplies on kanban so you don’t run out.  Cross train crews so others can jump in should a person be temporarily unavailable.
Customer’s sitting on hold while they get transferred from person to person.	Usually caused by not knowing what others do or are responsible for.  Complete process-level value stream mapping that spans multiple departments; you’ll be surprised with all the “so that’s what you do” comments.  Don’t have an automated phone system.  Fully train your Customer Service Team to be able to handle most customer questions and know exactly where to transfer a call should they not know an answer.
Not being able to start a meeting because everyone is not on time.	Clarify expectations.  Ask yourself if you’re ready for meetings on time consistently and are actually creating the problem (set a good example).  Create a closed-door practice at the time meetings are to start.
Waiting for someone else on the crew/team to finish their job so that you can keep going.	There must be something value-added you could be doing other than standing and waiting.  In production; grab a broom and use it, work on a different order/project or clean something.  In an office; return a missed call, start drafting that e-mail or work on something else.  Ideally you should help the other person and balance the workload so people aren't waiting for other people.

Your ultimate goal should be to discover all the times a process stops due to waiting, get to the root of why the waiting exists, then put countermeasures in place to eliminate the waiting.  Processes must flow.

Be FITT!