Waste / 7 Wastes

Initially defined in the Toyota Production System (TPS), there are seven (7) kinds of waste:

1. Overproduction - Do not produce products in advance or in excess of calculated demand as it wastes money, time, and space.

2. Waiting – Multi-step operations need to be balanced. Wait until one process is finished before beginning another one.

3. Transportation – Reduce or eliminate the need to move a product between manufacturing processes.

4. Over-engineered processing - Does the current process represent the simplest machinery/equipment and operation?

5. Inventory - Excessive inventory through the whole value chain creates costs of materials, space, manipulation, and maintenance.

6. Movement - Well designed workplace ergonomics (= minimal distances) should reduce/eliminate movement (= time loss) of machines and operators to required process steps.

7. Defects - Can you detect defects during operation? Have you installed inspection process steps? Inspecting and quarantining inventory takes time and costs money.