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Management Services Winter 2012


Leadership waste


Understanding and reducing leadership waste


Effi cient working that focuses on effective processes is the key to waste elimination, says Mike Keen.


“Waste reduction or elimination is not just an operational buzzword; moreover, it is an essential leadership trait, and a differentiator in the boardroom.”


Not a day goes by without business life presenting leaders with opportunities for improvement. Securing productivity improvements, delivering fi nancial leverage, attaining effi ciency gains and achieving objectives: these are phrases regularly heard across management and leadership teams the world over. They are drawn together by the inescapable fact that waste elimination is at the core of any kind of improvement. Becoming more effi cient, eliminating waste and being more productive are crucial at the leadership level, when it comes to behaviours, words and action. Waste reduction or elimination is not just an operational buzzword; moreover, it is an essential leadership trait, and a differentiator in the boardroom.


Organisations often experience leadership ineffi ciency manifesting itself in the form of unclear policies, contradictory strategy statements, blurred direction, internal politicking and power games, and personality confl icts. Although these leadership ineffi ciencies exist, organisations are still successful, despite themselves, as they often fi nd methods of coping with, and tolerating, this waste. So, despite organisations being successful, they could be so much more effi cient, if they would only attack the root causes of the waste.


Above is a typical summary


of the seven forms of waste, most frequently found in an operational arena. These are typically observable in process ineffi ciencies in factories and offi ces. Such improvement opportunities are born out of the mentality of ‘this is the way we’ve always done it’ or ‘it works and we are successful, so why change it’… Many actions in the leadership arena add little value, but are deemed to be essential. ‘Value’ is a concept that can be applied in a broad sense to the leadership of a business. For example, a leader looks to give clear direction, regular feedback and sound guidance, and in doing so, will add ‘value’ to the organisation and its teams. However, conversely, a leader will be ineffi cient or even create more ineffi ciency and waste not failing to give clear direction or sound, actionable advice that empowers teams to develop and perform at a higher level. Leadership waste can be


defi ned as ‘anything other than the exact amount of time, effort, communication, information, resource, assets, space, and effort that is absolutely essential to add value to an organisation’. Furthermore, any waste elimination effort has to be founded in a holistic approach to organisational life, and it has to be based on satisfying the internal customer (employees) or external customer by producing a high quality organisational culture, a highly motivated workforce,


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