MUDA in offices

Lean production is the management principle that focuses on eliminating waste so that all activities bring value from the customer's perspective, and value are those activities that are carried out to transform a product or service, from its initial form to a final form, requested by the customer, performed correctly the first time and for which the customer is willing to pay.

The term MUDA comes from the Japanese language and means waste or loss, an aspect popularized by Toyota starting with the 1950-60s, in short, any activity that consumes resources, but does not add value from the perspective of the final customer. In a factory when we talk about these waste, we automatically think of the production areas and that is correct, but they are also present in the administrative areas, not as clearly visible as in production, in more subtle forms, but they are there.

To improve, first of all we need to identify them, so here are some examples of the types of MUDA in offices:

• Overproduction or more than necessary, in offices is manifested by procedures, reports or documents that are not necessary, information, emails prepared in advance that are no longer sent or used, reports sent daily to several people, which is not of interest to everyone
• Unnecessary movements by searching for files on the server, searching for the latest version of a document, accessing several folders until the desired document is reached
• Stocks of pending or unfinished tasks, unread, unresolved emails, unprocessed files, projects put on "hold"
• Waiting time is one of the most frequent waste in the administrative area, waiting for answers, approvals, signatures or information
• Transport of documents between several departments or people, extra emails sent, received and sent again
• Defects through reports, documents, information with errors and/or incompleteness, their repetitive correction (rework)
• Excessive processing with overloading of documents, emails with irrelevant data, copying information into multiple systems, multi-level approvals for minor decisions, adjustments and readjustments, etc.

Identifying MUDA is an opportunity for improvement also in administrative areas to increase efficiency, simplify or automate procedures.