I recently discovered an article by Beau Groover that outlines his less-than-ideal experience in a government office process. He notes that at one point he was “almost three hours into this process and had accomplished absolutely nothing.” While Groover is clearly experienced in process improvement and has a trained eye for seeing that his experience wasn’t favorable, the general populous would also find this experience distasteful. It doesn’t take an expert to know that you are unhappily accomplishing nothing and wasting time. At the end of the article, he correctly concludes that the customer should be kept in mind when process development and improvement. It’s true, the customer is the most important part of business. The customer is the driving force behind why your business exists and the goal of your business should be to please the customer and improve ways of doing so.
The Third 5S Pillar: Shine
You eliminated clutter with Sort, and you organized with Set in Order, now it’s time to sanitize with Shine. The third step of the 5S methodology, Seiso or Shine, is a complete cleaning of the work cell. It is important to be thorough with the dusting, shining, sweeping, polishing, and maintaining of the space. A…
