The Golden Muda award...

The Golden Muda (Japanese word for waste) award is an honor bestowed on businesses that excel in wasteful expenditures of all types such as customer time, money, and the like. It's my way of saying...stop wasting and get lean!

Today's recipient is the Lowe's store on the east side of Indianapolis. I needed to locate some fire bricks for a fireplace project and so I called in to see if they had any in stock. After navigating through the needlessly long IVR menu, the phone started ringing. I lost track after ten rings and started praying that someone would answer. Once I got to a human being, the conversation went like this...

Lowes clerk #1: This is (name deleted) in Masonary. How may I help you?

Kaizeneer: Do you have any firebrick?

Lowes clerk #1: I don't know...let me check. (Puts me on hold)

Lowes clerk #1: I'll transfer you...

Lowes clerk #2: Lawn and garden, how can I help you?

Kaizeneer: Do you have any firebrick?

Lowes clerk #2: This is Lawn and garden, why did they transfer you to me? I'll transfer you...

Lowes clerk #1: This is (name deleted)in Masonary. How may I help you?

And this loop went on two more times before I hung up out of frustration. As it turned out, my dad and I developed a kaizen that didn't require firebrick at all once we reasoned through that the brick would never get more then maybe 125 degrees F based on what we were doing. So, we used bricks that I already had saving us a few dollars and at least 45 minutes driving. In this case, Lowe's muda led to a Lafever intergenerational kaizen. So, I award my first ever Golden Muda to Lowes on E 25th street in Indy! Congratulations on this prestigious honor.

What did you improve in 2008?

Dan Lafever, Kaizeneer

Kaizen at home - 8,154 reasons why continous improvement works for our family!

As I am ending the year of our Lord, 2008. I decided to go back and calculate the monetary value of various improvements made this year in our family budget. As I began to go back and determine the financial benefits, I was astounded at the savings...and I am not done with my totals yet.

So far, I have calculated $8,154.83 of savings, cash recovered from selling stuff we weren't using, recovered long lost gift cards, and other financial improvements. In a future column, I'll break down many of these from the big ones (Furnace replacement) to the small ones (picking free local apples and bike riding to work). Even the tiniest kaizens that save time and money can make a big difference when combined with medium and large scale improvements. In addition, I will attempt to determine the time savings and other benefits gained in 2008.

"There's a way to do it better - find it." Thomas A. Edison

What did you improve in 2008?

Dan Lafever, Kaizeneer

The Great Household Purge update - 12/16/08

We started our journey of purging the waste, or muda(Japanese word for waste) in July. Our household didn't become bogged down with junk in a day and it will take months to complete the process. Here's some of my latest stats:

-$1791 cash recovered from selling unused stuff
-$71 in cash and unused gift cards found during purging.
-Over 800 hundred items donated to charity
-A vehicle donated to a family of a cancer victim.
-At least 100 square feet of storage space recovered.

We're slowed down a bit as we coast to 2009 but slowly were are still purging. With Christmas and the year end approaching, we're trying to get the last of anything donated for a tax write off. I added $11 to the total as I took in more scrap metal although the scrap prices have fallen dramatically. The biggest opportunity I see is to to keep purging our household now while we have a chance. As the economy turns sour, we'll see garage sales of like we have never seen before and probably more bargain shoppers than you can shake a stick at. I have also been surprised at the local thrift store because they have stopped taking donations most days of the week. My guess is that customers aren't buying so they can't reduce their inventory. Which leads me to an improvement idea...

Kaizen opportunity - I am going to approach our local school to see if they use any of the excess supplies that I have to help students. That way, I am purging my items as well as helping needy kids in school. Practicing Kaizen helps you find win-win opportunities. Now more than ever, it's time to use creativity over capital!

Dan Lafever, Kaizeneer

Commercial Electric CFL bulbs - why these failed the kaizeneer's test

One of my kaizens at home several years ago was to replace all the incandescent bulbs with compact flourescent bulbs (CFL). The CFLs were more expensive so I made the replacements slowly over a matter of months. Later, I noticed the some of the CFL bulbs were failing pre-maturely. I had put my trust in the manufacturers claims of longer life but it wasn't panning out. So, I started writing the date of replacement on the base of the CFL with a black Sharpie so I would know how many days had elasped from installation to failure. Due to poor CFL quality, I was not able to realize the financial ROI that the Commercial Electric company claims-in fact, I am sure I lost money using this product.

To make a long story short, the Commercial Electric CFL bulbs I bought have had a high failure rate and have not lived up to the claims of long life when I checked the installation dates recorded. Foolish me, I didn't save the packaging or my receipt(another kaizen!) so I can't get them replaced. However, my kaizen of writing the installation dates on the bases has paid off and I will no longer purchase CFLs made by Commercial Electric. The brand names CFLs like Sylvania have fared much better. Here's the exact information on the bulbs that failed:

Commercial Electric CFL
SKU:292-460
Model EDXO-14
120V 60Hz
14W .200A
V # 42836

Keep on improving. You can't afford not to!

Dan Lafever, Kaizeneer

Funny Video Friday - 12/12/08

Signs you've had too much egg nog...

Leaving out too many cookies for Santa...


Overdoing the light displays...


Cartoon characters sing carols...


The Tweleve days of Christmas sounds like...Toto's Africa?


Merry Christmas!

Dan Lafever, Kaizeneer

Mix and match employer benefits to save cash.

Several years ago, my wife was a part time worker at a local hospital and I was employed by another. As a part time employee, she was not eligible for any benefits. So for years, I carried all the insurance our family needed. Then, two changes occurred that allowed us to explore new options and do a kaizen or improvement idea to get the same benefits at a lower cost.

-My wife’s new employer gave part time employees full benefits
-My employer no long made all benefits exclusive i.e. you could pick whatever insurance benefits you wanted (all, some, or none) instead of all or nothing.

The kaizen idea we came up with was to mix and match benefits for the best price. Here’s what we did this year:

If we took full medical, dental, and vision insurance from my wife’s plan, the cost was $216.91 per pay.

If we took full medical, dental, and vision insurance from my plan, the cost was $206.24 per pay or a savings of $10.67.

If we chose medical, dental, and vision insurance at the lowest price in each plan, the cost went down to $187.42, a savings of $29.49 over the most expensive benefits package. The really cool thing was that the dental and vision plans from each employer were identical. So, we get the same insurance at the lower cost-in case of the dental, it’s almost $30 less a pay.

The really cool thing is that my employer will pay any employee a set amount NOT to be on the company’s health insurance. So, our savings are now $79.49 a pay. That’s an almost $2000 a year saving. Try this mixing and matching benefits kaizen and see how you can use creativity over capital!

Dan Lafever, Kaizeneer

Prime numbers at the dental office.

1,2,3,7, and 13.

The kaizen given to me by Dr. Goldsmith’s office worked beautifully. They told me to set my appt. up first thing in the morning to reduce the wait time to be seen. I took their recommendation as well as taking my timing device and recorded each process step and rounded up to the nearest minute. Here is what I measured:

Arrival time: 7:35AM ( I must confess that I was 5 minutes late!)
Lounge wait time: 1 minute
Dental chair seating and Xray: 3 minutes
Wait to see dentist: 2 minutes
Root canal evaluation time: 7 minutes
Departure time: 7:48PM
Door to door turnaround time: 13 minutes

I was thrilled at the improvement and reduction in wait time and very pleased at the service I received. Both the assistant and Dr. Goldsmith set the appropriate time expectations and were very professional. One reason that I see that kaizen, or continuous improvement, works so well is that it embodies the value of humility. A proud person might complain or be rude in an effort to get better service instead of humbling themselves to ask the person who schedules appointments for help. In this case, I engaged myself, the expert of my own customer service expectations, and the office scheduler Jara, an expert at scheduling patients, to achieve an improvement of reducing wait times. Working together, we made it better.

I am so grateful for their collaboration to improve.

Dan Lafever, Kaizeneer