Are you a Time Cyclist?

One of the hidden costs of business is the cost of doing something inefficiently. You may have a process that gets the job done, and getting the job done feels good. Most people love to complete tasks, but a successfully completed task is not the ultimate measurement for good work. No, the ultimate measurement of good work is when the task is done right with the least amount of steps, people, and other resources needed to do the job. For the purposes of this article, we will refer to efficiency as just that - using the least amount of steps, people, and other resources necessary to do the job right.

So, what is a time cyclist? This is someone who is concerned with doing everything as efficiently as possible. When a task can be done with fewer steps, it just make sense that it will take less time. Just the same, when fewer people need to be involved in any process, the total process time will be reduced because one person is more efficient that two or more. Finally - fewer other resources. These could be office supplies and other materials, software programs, computers, documents, as well as a number of other resources, depending on the particular task. If a new customer can fill out one form to obtain credit instead of two or more, wouldn't it make sense that the total time of filling out a credit application would be reduced? Doesn't it also seem to take less time by using Microsoft Outlook to send email, maintain calendar items, and organize important tasks instead of using your ISP for email, a desk calendar, and a paper to-do list?

Minimizing all of these categories of efficiency reduces the total Cycle Time of all of your company's tasks. And, considering the old adage that "time is money," doesn't it make sense that you would want to reduce the time of everything that you and everyone in your company does? Of course it does! If you're able to help more customers in a shorter amount of time, you make more money. If you're able to do more work with less employees, you make more money. If you're able to get more work done with fewer materials, you make more money. That's the idea of being a time cyclist - to make more money for your company by doing things better (more efficiently).

You should evaluate all of the processes in your organization or business unit for inefficiencies. Your aim is to reduce the total number of steps needed to do each task as well as the total number of people that need to be involved with each task. Everywhere possible, you need to consolidate tasks, remove wasteful steps, and eliminate unnecessary resources. Look at each step from the customer's perspective. How will those steps effect your customers? When your customers see you getting more efficient, they will be WOW'd because they will appreciate you taking less of their time at the same time that you are earning more of their money.

When evaluating processes, write up all of the steps, with great detail, and include the name of the job title who does each step. It's very important that each step goes in order of the person doing the task. In other words, it is very inefficient to go from one person, to another, and then back to the first person, and then to a third person, and then back to the second person, and so on. The most efficient way to do any job is to not only minimize the number of people involved with the task, but the number of times each person has to handle something as well.

Imagine that you're a customer who is calling your bank to inquire about your current savings account balance (because you haven't figured out yet that you can do this online) and the person who answers the phone transfers you to someone else, and then that person transfers you to their manager who can't access their computer, so the manager transfers you back to the original person who answered the phone because he can view his computer fine. Don't you feel like a frustrated pin ball. Wouldn't it have been so much better if the first person that answered the phone would have just answered your question? Absolutely!

And this is the job of the time cyclist - to find inefficient processes and fix them so that customers are happy and the company reduces wasteful costs that lead to greater profits. But, like I said, these are often the hidden costs of business. Don't count on employees to tell you when something can be made easier - especially if that means making their position obsolete. Also, don't expect them to take the time to speak up when something isn't working right, because they are spending too much time working around the problems (insert the "Sharpen the Saw" story here. Google "sharpen the saw" and you can read this story on efficiency.).

So, become a great Time Cyclist and you will save your company a tremendous load of money. This could even be the difference between an overall profit or loss to some companies, and it certainly will set you on a path to breaking records.