We seem to love waste. We churn out so much of it daily.

We create documents on our computer. Then we print them out to review them. After we’ve made our corrections on the printed pages, we go back to the computer to update the document. We throw away the old printed version and print out a number of new versions to circulate so that our colleagues can then do the same thing.

We write emails to each other without taking the time to clearly articulate our message, and as a result waste time on long email trails full of misunderstanding and confusion.

We rush into doing work because of the pressure to deliver and end up wasting time reworking because we didn’t fully understand what was needed.

We organise our companies into functional silos, driving toward our wonderfully shortsighted ‘efficiencies of scale’ goal, only to waste our customer’s time by forcing them to endure a multitude of handoffs between our various silos as they try to move through what would seem in their eyes to be a simple process.

Lean up. Avoid the waste.