'The Toyota Way', this term, emphasizes the idea of improving workflow without irregularities or fluctuations, with consistent elimination of waste. It simply means that, if you want to achieve a fluid workflow, without having to sacrifice productivity, it is necessary to optimize the workflow by minimizing waste and be adaptable to the various situations that may arise. Taking this into account, there has been a growing awareness among government agencies to implement Lean principles while providing services to citizens. Say no to plagiarism. Get a tailor-made essay on "Why Violent Video Games Shouldn't Be Banned"? Get an Original Essay The idea of lean government, while unlikely, is making its way into most government agencies. Author Chew Jian Chieh, in his article on lean government, presented eight ideas that can bring revolutionary changes in the way government processes are carried out. The main intent of Lean is to keep the flow in one piece i.e. there should be a continuous and constant flow without any disturbance. The eight workable Lean strategies outlined by Chew Jian Chieh are summarized below. First, for any organization to function, it should revolve all its processes around Takt Time. Takt Time is a Lean concept that describes the speed with which the production of goods must comply with customer demand. For example, consider that a civil servant has to work for 8 hours a day, including 1 hour lunch and tea break, plus another hour for other miscellaneous work. This gives him a net time available for actual work of approximately 6 hours [8 – 1 – 1 = 6 hours (360 minutes)]. If he were to transmit 360 invoices per day, he would be required to transmit 1 per minute. However, this is not possible, as people or machines cannot always guarantee 100% efficiency. There may be some obstacles in the workflow that prevent it from being a one-piece flow process. Usually government agencies do not follow the concept of Takt time. This results in a wavy pile of work for employees. Therefore, they may face some problems to deliver the work on time to the clients. In this regard, the author highlights that to speed up processes or reduce unnecessary steps, government agencies should adopt Lean methodologies to improve effectiveness. They should make sure to use the concept of Takt Time for process improvement. Secondly, for any processing phase, to be in sync with the Takt Time, it should have the right duration. One of the challenges faced by government agencies is variations in customer demands. There isn't always a constant flow. Ultimately this may lead to downtime for the agency, but on the other hand, if there is a surge in customer requests, their service may be delayed, as the counter process is not synchronized with the flow of incoming requests. Therefore, if adequate trail is maintained, the necessary personnel can be made available to meet the requirements. Not only should staff be skilled in their jobs, but they should also adapt to any environment. Furthermore, the arrangement of most government value streams relies on clustering a similar type of function in one place. They are classified into different departments such that only a specific type of function can be performed on that specific counter, after which you may have to travel a certain distance to complete the next function. With these configurations, it becomes complicated to perform a task. A lot of time is wasted in waiting and intransport. Lean methodologies imply that the structure should be such that all departments are grouped together or arranged one after another in the form of cells, which will help customers perform all necessary functions serially. Therefore there are no inventories in progress. Also, no question of batch jobs being held waiting for further functions to complete. This saves almost 50% of time and effort. Also, everyone should be equally skilled and flexible with any type of work for the smooth flow of the process. Normally, in government agencies, they have the mentality that once similar type of work accumulates, they will start working on It. Government personnel must be multitasking, dealing equally with a variety of tasks, as well as some priority issues. As they believe that once they complete the setup for a particular job, they can do all similar types of jobs in one go, which helps them to increase their personal efficiency. Although it is not that easy to set up work cells in government agencies, there may be an alternative solution to manage all the processes on time. Furthermore, every organization should follow the First In, First Out policy. This generally means that the highest priority should be given to the work that arrives first. In government agencies, however, this is not the case, as orders are delivered in tray form. The result of this is usually that what comes last gets completed first. This then leads to disturbances in order processing times, which ultimately results in an overall delay of the customer's needs as a whole. There should always be a pull system instead of a push system, to avoid delays in deliveries. Typically, it seems, one person ends up doing all the work. If a person is known to complete a certain task effectively, they are often burdened with that type of work. This develops an imbalance in the assigned work. Therefore, for an organization to maintain a constant balance between work culture, it should adapt methodologies to standardize work and ensure that the load is equally divided. Likewise, to be free of any pending work it is better to finish it work on the same day itself. Government officials believe that the work assigned to them cannot be completed on the same day. For this reason they end up with many backlogs. Consider that 200 tasks arrive for officials to complete every day. Of which only 50 are completed on the same day. For the next day they receive 200 tasks again and only 50 are completed. In this way the 150 tasks of each day accumulate and are never completed. For this, value streams should be designed so that work is done the same day it is received. Finally, the author rightly states that a value stream map should be followed in any government agency. Mapping the value stream essentially means taking note of the current situation and consequently planning future events in the supply of the product or service, with the aim of eliminating Lean waste compared to the current scenario. Once the value stream mapping is done, government officials are then aware of their tasks, as well as the overall time that has been wasted in non-productive phases, the ongoing inventories that have caused fluctuations, the waste that is created due to rework and time wasted in transportation. Therefore, it is useful for government officials to map their value streams that offers them a.
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