WASTE IN PRODUCTION

Waste: Anything other than the exact amount of equipment, materials, parts, space, and workers' efforts that are absolutely essential to add value to a product. This is: Everything that increases production

costs without adding value to what is being produced.

Value-Added: Anything that the customer wants and is willing to pay for it.

Non-Value-Added: Anything that the customer doesn't wants and won’t pay for it.

Types of Waste in Production1. Overproduction.2. Wait Time.3. Transportation waste.4. Processing waste.5. Motion/Movement waste.6. Inventory waste.7. Defects waste.

Overproduction

Producing more products than is needed, faster than needed or before they are needed is a waste.

Adding extra units to the quantity needed “just in case” or building to a pre-defined lot or batch size is also wasteful.

Consequences of Over-Production Loss of Production Control. Fixing rejects becomes a low priority. Increased Mix-ups, mistakes and

confusion. Valuable time and resources consumed

(wasted) building products that are not a priority.

Overproduction Causes

Poor Planning Process. “Just-in-case” instead of “Just-in-time” production. Poor communications between departments. Low Capability Processes, that are unable of

producing the quantity and/or quality required in a consistent basis.

Prolonged setup and cycle times. Sub-optimization caused by local optimization

(Processes that benefits a single department’s interests against the organization’s interests).

Low equipment reliability.

Wait Time

Wait time waste occurs when a worker cannot proceed with the next task in a process.

There are workers waiting and doing nothing (wasting their time or making others waste theirs) while others workload is excessive.

Wait Time causes

Lack of an adequate maintenance. Need of proper tools or materials. Lengthy setup times. Lack of cross training. Lack of SOP or undocumented work

methods. Production bottle necks. Irregular distribution of training.

Consequences of Wait Time waste

Personnel that cost doing nothing (adding no value).

Delays that lead to overtime to conclude what was programmed.

Costs due to inefficient processes that exceed the standard costs.

Loss of motivation; Low morale.

Transportation Waste

Any material movement that does not directly support immediate production.

When product is transported to a place other than the next process location or, the next process is not located adjacent to the current one.

Examples of Transportation waste Units are parked off the production floor to

gather a “full lot” for a batch operation. Production Lots that are sent off to the other

side of the plant for the next process step. This can occur, either between operations or

within an operation where workstations are not properly laid off.

Containers that are too big and difficult to open or close.

Excess of material handling equipment. Lift-trucks that travel empty.

Transportation waste causes

Improper Facility Layout Large buffers . Large lot purchasing or processing. Poor production planning. Poor scheduling. Poor work place organization.

Processing waste

Any unnecessary step, either production or communication, that adds no value to a product or service.

Occurs when we execute an operations, and the customer is not willing to pay for what is being done.

Processing waste causes

Lack of a concurrent design. Processes poorly documented (Lack of

SOP’s). Lack of customer input concerning

requirements. Poor configuration control. Quality Standards not related to

customer needs. Redundant inspections and approvals.

Consequences of Processing waste Time spent building a feature that is

irrelevant to the customer and that the customer will not pay for.

Additional costs for materials used in excess.

Lack of control because improper use of design documents.

Products that either, exceed the requirements of the customer or fail to comply with them.

Motion/Movement waste

Anymovement of people which does not contribute to add value to the product or service.

Persons moving from one place to another create a false impression of being working, while in reality, are doing nothing. They are costing while adding no value.

Consequences of Motion/Movement waste

Employees move from one workstation to another, doing nothing.

They are unnecessary trips. No value is added during this process. Include time spent looking for parts,

tools, fixtures, etc. Include time spent going to/froma

warehouse.

Motion/Movement waste Causes Ineffective Layouts (equipment, office

and plant). Lack of Visual controls. Poor Process Documentation. Poor work place organization.

Inventory waste

Any supply (Materials or Goods) in excess of what is required to deliver products in a Just-In-Time manner.

These parts will need to be processed, moved, counted, stored, etc. Will add to costs and can not be shipped to our customers.

Inventory waste causes

Poor sales forecasting (Demand Forecasting). Long lead times (set-up and cycle times). Poor inventory planning. Poor inventory tracking. Unbalanced production processes. Processes that can not produce the required

quantity or quality of products in a consistent manner.

Suppliers that can not supply the required quantity or quality of products in a consistent manner.

Consequences of Inventory waste Large lot purchases of raw materials,

only to be stored for weeks or months. Very large WIP’s inventories. Low inventory turnover. Need of large

working capital to finance inventories. Damaged Products. Obsolete products.

Defects waste

Costs due to sorting, repairing and/or repairing products.

Include cost of materials scrapped due to defects. Also consist in the cost of goods returned by customers,

recall campaigns. Recycling part of the products is also a waste.

Defects waste causes

Too many product models. High inventory levels. Inadequate tools/equipment. Poor employee training. Poor layouts. Unnecessary handling. Poor process documentation. Processes that can not produce the required quantity

or quality of products in a consistent manner. Suppliers that can not supply the required quantity

or quality of products in a consistent manner.

Consequences of Defects waste Excessive processing costs. Many additional non-value-added

processes or operations. Additional quality control inspections

needed. Damaged relations with customers.