The 8 Wastes & DOWNTIME
DOWNTIME is an acronym that represents the eight wastes in continuous improvement: Defects, Overproduction, Waiting, Non-Utilized Resources, Transportation, Inventory, Motion, and Excessive Processing.
Committing to a culture of continuous improvement at any organization means believing it’s always possible to create more value for the customer. At the same time, it can be challenging to spot steps in a product or service’s journey downstream that don’t add value, especially if they’re deeply ingrained routines. Taiichi Ohno, the Toyota Production System mastermind and forefather of Lean, made these easier to detect and address by identifying seven different kinds of “waste” (muda in Japanese), which include assembly line-specific problems like product defects and process bottlenecks. But Lean Six Sigma problem-solving strategies have applications well beyond the world of widgets to areas like financial services and healthcare, where waste is much more invisible - and much tougher to detect.
Lean Six Sigma tools such as value-stream mapping and root-cause analysis can be highly effective methods for identifying product and process inefficiencies but understanding the different types of waste is a crucial first step. The following is a quick primer on Ohno’s seven wastes, plus the eighth: non-utilized resources. They’re presented via an easy-to-remember acronym: DOWNTIME.
DOWNTIME Explained
Defects
Defects occur when a product or service fails to meet the requirements of internal or external customers. Put simply, defects are mistakes.
Example: The battery on a new smartphone rapidly degrades in longevity, prompting consumers to seek out replacements or flee the product altogether.
Overproduction
Overproduction happens when products are produced (or services delivered) at a rate that exceeds customer demand. While “too much” might seem better than “too little,” this can lead to other forms of waste (see “Inventory”) and is a sign that additional value-adds can be incorporated into the product or process instead of overproduction.
Example: A financial services analytical team produces several internal data reports, but only a few are needed to inform decision-making, making the unread reports a useless effort.
Waiting
Think of this form of waste as the “bottleneck.” Waiting represents time spent in queues between steps in a process. In short, products and processes should flow with as little idle time as possible because a standstill is a symptom of problems upstream or downstream.
Example: An emergency room department moves incoming patients smoothly through check-in but discovers that many patients are waiting several hours to be seen by a physician once in a triage bed.
Non-Utilized Resources
This addition to Ohno’s original seven wastes represents untapped employee potential, specifically in achieving perfect flow. This waste occurs when people are seen solely as a source of labor and are not engaged in the pursuit of continuous improvement.
Example: A company includes managers and upper-level executives in kaizen events but leaves out frontline employees, who often carry critical insights about product and process issues.
Transportation
Transportation refers to wasted time moving products or other process-related elements unnecessarily or excessively. Production and service delivery nearly always involves some movement, but it’s up to operational excellence teams to “cut to the bone” and find the most efficient way to achieve it.
Example: An original equipment manufacturer orders parts from a supplier with an extremely long shipping time, leaving raw per-unit savings to question.
Inventory
Inventory waste is related to overproduction in that it represents an excess of raw materials, work-in-progress, or finished goods, tying up capital and storage space. This inventory may be on hand for future customers, but the risks are high and manifold: damage, theft, and obsolescence, to name a few possibilities.
Example: A restaurant orders expensive printed menus in great excess of need that are stored in boxes and soon to be out of date by the following season.
Motion
Motion waste relates to transportation in that it involves movement, but motion refers specifically to the movement of people. Even if the flow of a product appears smooth and efficient at a distance, waste occurs if employees take unnecessary physical steps to make it happen.
Example: A nurse in an ICU ward must walk to a supply closet on the other side of the building to load patient hygiene products.
Excessive Processing
Excessive processing can be summarized as “too much for no good reason.” This waste occurs when product or service features exceed what the customer is willing to pay for. Exceeding customer expectations is a noble goal for any product or service, but sometimes, the extra work does not add value.
Example: A software development firm adding additional “bells and whistles” to a new product that voice-of-the-customer work never indicated was desired.
Summary
Now that you have a clearer picture of product and process waste, they’ll be easier to identify and tackle in your team’s next Kaizen event. Remember, “the way it’s always been done” can be a powerful opposing force to change. There’s always a better way, and it starts by putting a name and face on issues that can lurk inside processes in any industry in the pursuit of “perfect flow.”
