Workshop

Overview

The full day LEAN Office training workshop involves a mix of classroom style learning with an interactive live simulation where class participants take  on the roles of managers and workers within a company. During the class time participants learn lean definitions and techniques. Then, the participants work in a traditional office environment with forms, calculators, and procedures. Throughout the day, they explore the application of LEAN techniques in the simulated office. By the end of the workshop, they have helped redesign a Leaner Office that gets more done with less effort.

The overall result is in that the customer is better satisfied with the performance, and the workers are too.

In the Office live simulation, two departments are setup and staffed to process Request For Quotations (RFQ) and Purchase Orders (PO) that come from the company's customers. The two departments are the Sales Department and the Estimating Department. The Sales Department handles all interactions with the customer. The Sales Department receives RFQ's, requests quotes, checks credit, receives PO's, accepts PO's, issues Sales Orders, and other customer contact. The Estimation Department provides current quotes on manufacturing and material costs, and inventory availability. 

To apply the Lean techniques, the office is transformed in three "stages" or "days". Improvements are implemented at the end of each "stage" or "day". Through the implementation of the LEAN techniques, the office work is transformed from a confused and a slow process to a much more efficient, effective, and predictable one.