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The old adage goes: If you want to make money, you need to spend money. But when you spend money, money is inevitably wasted. This is particularly true during the manufacturing process when so many different factors are at play like cogs in a huge machine. In fact, manufacturing Forbes reported that 20% of business revenue is lost to waste.

Here’s the good news. Lean Manufacturing is the concept and action of cutting back waste during the manufacturing process. There are seven types of waste to be aware of: overproduction, transport, motion, defects, waiting, and overprocessing. Let’s take a look at each and discover how Sage software can help minimize waste and get business booming again.

Overproduction

This one seems obvious. When you make too much of something, you tie up capital and resources into a product that ultimately is not sold. Now you have to find more money and attain more resources. Not only is this practice wasteful for your business, but it also harms the environment.

Lean Manufacturing Tip: Sage products keep overproduction to a minimum. By monitoring and keeping production, warehouses, and purchasing processes in line with demand, you can control and manage your supply chain.

Transport

In the production process, people and materials need to be moved from one place to another. Not only does all this movement have an impact on the environment, but the more that your products move around, the more likely they might be damaged or even lost along the way—which can be expensive to replace.

Lean Manufacturing Tip: Software helps you adapt and change plans by managing logistic flows wherever you’re sending products. With visual dashboards of real time data, you can see what’s happening and avoid costly movement when it’s not needed. 

Motion

How things move—not only by vehicle, but how machine parts move to keep production on track as well as the role that people play in creating products and services. How is motion wasteful? Machines and the people operating them can move in ways that cause injury, stress, and general wear-and-tear. This can lead to problems as well as downtime to repair and recover. 

Lean Manufacturing Tip: Stay on top of maintenance and fix small issues before they become larger problems. With a single system in place, Sage allows for preventative maintenance, work order control, early diagnosis and statistical analysis.

Defects

Faulty or damaged (or even hazardous) materials not only affect the safety of your employees and customers, but also affect your reputation. It’s important to identify and faulty batches and compromised materials, as well as if the problem has been happening for a while. In this way you can stop wasting resources on damaged goods immediately.

Lean Manufacturing Tip: With real-time data at your fingertips, you can identify exactly where issues lie at any stage. Project management tools offer much more efficient product and project tracking—increasing planning accuracy and reducing the number of defects. 

Waiting

Similar to inventory, this is all about making sure that products aren’t sitting idle during any stage of the manufacturing process. Whether products are between workstations, sat on shelves, or stored in warehouses, idle products tie up a significant portion of capital. Capital that isn’t adding value only costs you more as you wait. 

Lean Manufacturing Tip:  Sage and other accounting software products share information for oversight of the entire manufacturing process. Everything can be accessed easily so that everyone knows what stages products are at, and when to expect them—no more need to wait. 

Overprocessing

Sometimes additional extras or options are added to a product that the end user didn’t ask for. It’s great customer service to go the extra mile, but it always has to add value to your bottom line. 

Lean Manufacturing Tip: Sage helps prevent the duplication of records and help optimize workflow by managing all manufacturing processes with a single system. From Bill of Materials planning (BOM) to shop floor control, using a single system puts you in definite control with increased planning accuracy. 

 

Cutting back on waste can be intimidating—before you do it. With Sage’s cutting edge software, you can happily step into a new tomorrow, knowing you have made the smartest decisions for your profit and for the world. 

 

Sydney Luchansky

Author Sydney Luchansky

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