Ten Steps To Substantially Reduce Expensive Rework

By Damien Parker | September 24, 2014

Now here’s a whack on the head for all those people who are just so busy they have to take shortcuts and perhaps, we’ve all been guilty of this from time to time, hey?

Do we really save time by taking the shortcut? Maybe, provided nothing goes wrong and in addition to saving time, we don’t use up extra resources in taking the shortcut.

Of course, we tend to justify the necessity to take the shortcut by saying that we “haven’t got time” and that being the case, here’s my challenge for you to seriously consider:

Why is it that we don’t have time to do it right the first time,
but we can always find time to do it over?

You see, not only do we find the extra time to fix the situation when we have to – and research suggests this is between 2.0 and 2.5 times the time input in doing the job correctly in the first place, but we’ve very likely frustrated and angered other parties as well…heaven help us if this person is a paying customer!

shcoolFurther it’s not just the lost time in needless rework, what about the lost opportunity which might well have been grabbed had we not been involved in rework.

Yep, do it right the first time beats the heck out of take the shortcut and risk having to repair or patch up the problem at a later date.

 

And a shortcut is only a genuine shortcut if it can be proved over the long run to have saved time and with no additional resources having been consumed.

If you’ve got rework problems at your place of business think about using the following 10 steps:

  1. Does the problem have a name?
  2. Does it have an owner who fully accepts the responsibility?
  3. Has the problem (and its boundaries) been defined in writing?
  4. Have the necessary resources and solution implementers been identified?
  5. Have customers been identified and required outputs clearly specified?
  6. Are supplies identified and required inputs specified?
  7. Has a process flow been established and has each individual task been identified?
  8. Are the control points adequate; do they ensure control?
  9. Have the customers understanding of success been fully understood by us?
  10. Is there a formal mechanism for capturing measurements of the process, and is it providing feedback for improvement?

Now, given that I am a SYSTEMS focused kind of guy because SYSTEMS stands for SaveYour Self Time Energy Money & Stress…surely such situations as rework can be avoided by the use of proven templates.

Here’s to more sales, profits and cash from your business,

Damien Parker
Business Improvement Specialist
www.salesprofitscash.com
Follow my Tweets: @salesprofitcash

 

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