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Casual Articles - Re-energise Your Business - Removing Friction & Delay
Much is written about the how to achieve business success. From the Balance Scorecard for business to The On-Purpose Business, business owners have a wealth of information to turn their hard efforts into bountiful success. Yet, success still eludes many.What I have recently discovered as a small business coach, is that there are 3 distinct and separate capacities that every business has regardless of size and how these are used determines The Success Advantage Factor. Planning Execution Measurementme and energy away from the main goals. Ask customers (or have people ask their customers): What are we doing that is causing friction for you? What are we doing that is causing you delay, frustration or confusion?
Look for work piling up in front of some resource or person.
Typically that’s a sign of a bottleneck that is causing friction and delay for the business overall.
Observe people as they do their work.
What are they wasting time doing? Note: this can be applied at all levels of the organization!
Participate in process mapping session
Before you open the doors of your cleaning business you not only need equipment and supplies, you need a name for your business. The name of your company will be the first thing prospective clients see - whether that is in the phone book, on your company car, in an ad, or on a website. The name symbolizes what your cleaning business represents. So it is important to spend some time on choosing a name that not only fits your cleaning business, but also presents a positive image to customers, suppliers and employees.The easiest way to name your business it to use your own name or initials, such as Joe Smith's Cleanin
Sometimes delays are important, but if you're not adding value, then it is not good.
Some level of friction and delay are prevalent in virtually every business. Depending on what you are trying to achieve, they are not automatically bad things. There are times when deliberately slowing down (introducing delay to) an activity is the right thing to do. But where they are a result of poorly evolved processes, lack of training or resources, or lack of knowledge - it's time to take action and remove them from your life!
How can we define Friction and Delay? Friction is whatever gets in the way of a smooth and uninterrupted flow of events. Think of sliding along a bench covered in sandpaper versus one covered with oil. Delay is adding time without adding value.
High levels of these in any business are expensive, leading to lower productivity, and higher costs.
Why do businesses tolerate these levels of friction and delay??
They are considered a cost of doing business.
Many business owners don’t know or realize that there is another way of doing things – a way that could really improve their business
The business suffers from inertia when it comes to improvements.
Inefficiencies cause significantly lower productivity as employees create workarounds to get the job done. Over time, the workarounds become the accepted process, and the opportunity for taking action on the source of the problem is forgotten
Too much time is wasted on dealing with the symptoms.
Many owners spend tremendous time and energy dealing with the results of delay and friction in their organizations without striking at the cause of the problems
They don't know what to do.
Often when owners do identify the cause of friction and delay, they do not know how to reduce or eliminate the friction and delay
So how do you identify areas of delay and friction?
Ask people what drives them crazy about their job.
Ask people what they know irritates their customers, both external and internal customers.
Ask them what they are tolerating.
Ask people where they waste the most time.
Note: don’t confuse busy-ness with business. Look for things that are taking time and energy away from the main goals.
Ask customers (or have people ask their customers): What are we doing that is causing friction for you? What are we doing that is causing you delay, frustration or confusion?
Look for work piling up in front of some resource or person.
Typically that’s a sign of a bottleneck that is causing friction and delay for the business overall.
Observe people as they do their work.
What are they wasting time doing? Note: this can be applied at all levels of the organization!
Participate in process mapping session
Is your office buried under a flood of papers? If so, you are not alone. Papers are accumulated everywhere: employees maintain a personal archive, each office maintains an archive and then there is an official company archive. The result is storage requirements for paper documents grows at a rate of 20-25% every year.
If that cost alone wasn’t hurting businesses, Sarbanes-Oxley now requires businesses to properly maintain and quickly retrieve many business records. Morgan Stanley failed to properly retain and produce records related to several investigations and were forced to settle with the Securities and Exchan
How can we define Friction and Delay? Friction is whatever gets in the way of a smooth and uninterrupted flow of events. Think of sliding along a bench covered in sandpaper versus one covered with oil. Delay is adding time without adding value.
High levels of these in any business are expensive, leading to lower productivity, and higher costs.
Why do businesses tolerate these levels of friction and delay??
They are considered a cost of doing business.
Many business owners don’t know or realize that there is another way of doing things – a way that could really improve their business
The business suffers from inertia when it comes to improvements.
Inefficiencies cause significantly lower productivity as employees create workarounds to get the job done. Over time, the workarounds become the accepted process, and the opportunity for taking action on the source of the problem is forgotten
Too much time is wasted on dealing with the symptoms.
Many owners spend tremendous time and energy dealing with the results of delay and friction in their organizations without striking at the cause of the problems
They don't know what to do.
Often when owners do identify the cause of friction and delay, they do not know how to reduce or eliminate the friction and delay
So how do you identify areas of delay and friction?
Ask people what drives them crazy about their job.
Ask people what they know irritates their customers, both external and internal customers.
Ask them what they are tolerating.
Ask people where they waste the most time.
Note: don’t confuse busy-ness with business. Look for things that are taking time and energy away from the main goals.
Ask customers (or have people ask their customers): What are we doing that is causing friction for you? What are we doing that is causing you delay, frustration or confusion?
Look for work piling up in front of some resource or person.
Typically that’s a sign of a bottleneck that is causing friction and delay for the business overall.
Observe people as they do their work.
What are they wasting time doing? Note: this can be applied at all levels of the organization!
Participate in process mapping session
So many contractors go out of business because their construction cost estimating is too low or too high. When the amount estimated in not high enough the company can lose a lot of money; when the estimate is too high you lose the job to a competitor and gain a bad reputation. If either occurs enough times it can result in total failure for the company. Human error is something that will always happen to some degree, and if you want to cut mistakes out completely, you need construction cost estimating software. It can seem overwhelming knowing which is the best construction cost estimating software for your particular com
The business suffers from inertia when it comes to improvements.
Inefficiencies cause significantly lower productivity as employees create workarounds to get the job done. Over time, the workarounds become the accepted process, and the opportunity for taking action on the source of the problem is forgotten
Too much time is wasted on dealing with the symptoms.
Many owners spend tremendous time and energy dealing with the results of delay and friction in their organizations without striking at the cause of the problems
They don't know what to do.
Often when owners do identify the cause of friction and delay, they do not know how to reduce or eliminate the friction and delay
So how do you identify areas of delay and friction?
Ask people what drives them crazy about their job.
Ask people what they know irritates their customers, both external and internal customers.
Ask them what they are tolerating.
Ask people where they waste the most time.
Note: don’t confuse busy-ness with business. Look for things that are taking time and energy away from the main goals.
Ask customers (or have people ask their customers): What are we doing that is causing friction for you? What are we doing that is causing you delay, frustration or confusion?
Look for work piling up in front of some resource or person.
Typically that’s a sign of a bottleneck that is causing friction and delay for the business overall.
Observe people as they do their work.
What are they wasting time doing? Note: this can be applied at all levels of the organization!
Participate in process mapping session
Making the Best of Your Time and ResourcesCongratulations! You’re the new maintenance manager of Megamonolith Corporation. Although you’re exited about the position, you realize you have your work cut out for you. Megamonolith recently bought out another company, and you’re assigned to the site. During your first six months, you conduct a facilities audit and discover that the prior maintenance program consisted only of breakdown repairs. (For information about facility audits, please refer to my white paper “The Facilities Audit” available through my website at www.fps-fm.com.)One of the first things you need
They don't know what to do.
Often when owners do identify the cause of friction and delay, they do not know how to reduce or eliminate the friction and delay
So how do you identify areas of delay and friction?
Ask people what drives them crazy about their job.
Ask people what they know irritates their customers, both external and internal customers.
Ask them what they are tolerating.
Ask people where they waste the most time.
Note: don’t confuse busy-ness with business. Look for things that are taking time and energy away from the main goals.
Ask customers (or have people ask their customers): What are we doing that is causing friction for you? What are we doing that is causing you delay, frustration or confusion?
Look for work piling up in front of some resource or person.
Typically that’s a sign of a bottleneck that is causing friction and delay for the business overall.
Observe people as they do their work.
What are they wasting time doing? Note: this can be applied at all levels of the organization!
Participate in process mapping session
In 2004 it was estimated that the UK Air Freight market was worth ?726.1m and most of this was attributed to international services and the domestic service is very limited as it is dominated by road transport operators.British Airways which offers an air freight service as a by product of its passenger operations are the biggest provider of air freight capacity, but non-scheduled operations are beginning to grow quickly as well.There are a number of positive influences in relation to the UK air freight companies and these are as follows:-1. Growth in world trade and the chance of new markets opening up
Look for work piling up in front of some resource or person.
Typically that’s a sign of a bottleneck that is causing friction and delay for the business overall.
Observe people as they do their work.
What are they wasting time doing? Note: this can be applied at all levels of the organization!
Participate in process mapping session - map out the suspect process with the people who do the work.
Now that you’ve identified the sources of friction and delay, how do you go about removing them?
1. Eliminate the step.
If it doesn't add value, just don't do it.
2. Streamline the step.
Are there parts of the step that don’t add value? Can it be done a better smarter way?
Hint: the people doing the work most often know what would help most.
3. Increase the throughput at the bottleneck.
- Consider increasing capacity – longer shifts, more machines, additional employees.
- Consider outsourcing some or all of the work – can be external or internal to business.
- Consider automating the process.
Special Note: automate the process only AFTER making sure that the process works! This may sound trivial, but more money has been wasted by small (and large) businesses automating processes that were broken in the first place so that more mistakes were made quicker at higher cost.
4. Slow the entire system to the natural flow.
This may sound counter-intuitive, but it prevents having to do things over, and accentuates the need to improve bottlenecks. Doing things right the first time eliminates error and rework, reducing the cost to the business.
Finally, because all businesses are dynamic and people are human, friction and delay can creep back into your business pretty easily. Develop a mindset of continuous improvement and harness the abilities of everyone in your business to always be looking for ways to do things differently or better.
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