Mar 10 2010

I still find it amazing how some people still fail to realise that a lack of urgency can kill a business. I am not suggesting that people should race around and work at speeds that will lead to an early grave, I am not even referring to the speed at which people work. However, when things need doing, do we get straight at it or do we hem & haw (WMMC) and spend more time and energy looking for reasons to delay the required activity than it would actually take to complete it.

In a factory the other day a machine was in the middle of a change and the crew up and left it to go to lunch. While I do not bemoan people having lunch, couldn’t they have either waited until after the change was done or delayed the changeover until after lunch.

People do not often think about these things, how much productivity is lost due to poorly planned breaks, changeovers, meetings schedules and more. How often do we think holistically and consider the impact of our actions on the bigger picture? Having a sense of urgency does not mean racing around like a mad man, it does however mean that we think about how we can maximise our effectiveness by planning our activities appropriately.