Using technology to buoy continuous improvement

When you look at any company with productivity and efficiency issues, bloated operations and procedures tend to be at the core of the problems. Inefficient policies and workflows will hinder any company. Regardless of whether they are affecting production lines at a manufacturer or communication channels in an office environment, waste and redundancy are often the underlying causes.

So how can businesses reduce wastes that bog them down and impact their ability to operate? Many companies and organizations have turned to a combination of new technology and established Lean practices to help eliminate the redundancies they face.

For example, Yale University chief information officer (CIO) Leonard Peters just helped the institution undergo a year-long transition to use the cloud for several information technology functions. The initial migration is now complete, but Peters told the CIO Journal that the university still has about six months before the systems is running the way he wants it.

“This isn't the kind of thing where you stand up and declare victory,” Peters explained. “You need to move into a continuous improvement phase.”

Peters arrived at Yale last year, and his first course of action was to transition the institution's IT service management system to the cloud. The system governs a tremendous amount of activity at the school, including email functions, a business software system, research clusters, ticketing activity for athletic programs and even operations for campus police.

Before Peters was brought on, Yale struggled to maximize value from the system because it was bloated and difficult to operate. Once the cloud transition has been fully completed, he expects to see returns within 13 months as his staff begins focusing less on maintenance work and more on innovative computing projects.

“I think we're moving up that value chain,” Peters added. “That doesn't mean we're going to sacrifice quality in the space because, fundamentally, if you don't get the basics right, no one wants to talk to you about anything innovative.”

Going Lean through technology

At the core of Lean philosophy is the notion of maximizing value from every person and process within a company. If even one piece of equipment or a single employee isn't being fully used, companies are operating with waste and redundancy.

Technology enables businesses to streamline workflow and maximize their employees' time. In the Yale scenario, the IT team was being held back by the need to constantly maintain the service management system. By integrating the cloud and offloading many of those maintenance issues to another party, the IT team has been relieved of that low-level duty and is now better able to focus on functions that drive value.

By integrating the appropriate IT solutions, any company or organization can strive to achieve similar results. By investing in the right technology, Informatica suggests businesses could eliminate wastes and reduce project lead times by 90 percent, increase team productivity by 50 percent and drive significant continuous improvement in project quality.

The key is improving agility without sacrificing any other elements. The cloud, for example, enables established third-party organizations to take care of the storage and maintenance of many services and data. Yes, that means your business is relying on another company to take care of some mission-critical tasks. But at the same time, these companies are experts at what they do. It's just like any other business partnership in that regard.