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Organisational Mechanics

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Productivity for Productivity’s Sake

15 May, 2016 by James Lawther 7 Comments

stock waste

The obsession We love to make things more productive. We strive to be cheaper, more efficient, higher yielding.  It is the holy grail, taking up most of our working hours. More for less in itself isn’t a bad goal, but who decides if we are being productive? Myopic measurement Imagine you flip burgers for a living and you […]

Filed Under: Blog, Operations Analysis Tagged With: lean thinking, McDonald's, measurement, office productivity, over-production, stock, systems thinking

Issues, Incidents and Risk Events

13 April, 2016 by James Lawther 3 Comments

Scoop out your eyeball

Boring meetings Issues, incidents, risk events, screw ups, call them what you will, we all have them.  Somewhere in your organisation somebody is logging them, categorising them and recording them.  That somebody also has a target to reduce them. And every month they hold a meeting to discuss how they are doing. And — be honest — […]

Filed Under: Blog, Operations Analysis Tagged With: customer complaints, insight, measurement, objective setting, targets

What Are You Missing?

3 April, 2016 by James Lawther 3 Comments

Waiting Room

I have to manage your expectations It is a horrible phrase. I hate it when somebody says to me. It means that I am not going to get what I want when I want it. I am being softened up. There is going to be a delay. Suddenly I am thrown into the cost or […]

Filed Under: Blog, Operations Analysis Tagged With: assumptions, innovation, medicine, queue, TED talks, waiting

Are You Making Waves?

6 February, 2016 by James Lawther 8 Comments

All operations have the same problem… They all have times when they are busy and times when they are slack.  Feast or Famine. It is the way of the world: If you sell Christmas crackers it will always be busy in October If you run a gym you will always have a rush in January […]

Filed Under: Blog, Operations Analysis Tagged With: capacity, mura, supply and demand

The Problem with Cause and Effect

20 December, 2015 by James Lawther 8 Comments

Northern Rock

We think in straight lines Cause and effect. If I do this, then that will happen.  If I make this change then I will get that outcome. Unfortunately the world isn’t like that.  An initiative might work for a while, but then it will stop or backfire. Unintended consequences and side effects bedevil us.  Performance will plateau or […]

Filed Under: Blog, Operations Analysis Tagged With: problem solving, systems thinking, test and learn

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