Historically Manufacturing has been the area where improvement activities have been concentrated, in the belief that reduction in unit cost is all that is needed to be competitive. Little time has been spent examining the support activities because that is ‘just what has to be done’, to support manufacturing. But administration adds lead time and if you take a look into any administrative process there is waste. There are piles of paperwork, full e-mail inboxes, documents going from one department to the next, double entry, complicated systems, ineffective meetings, and meaningless measures, to name but a few. Successful businesses now have to compete in all areas of their operations to stay ahead of the competition.

The typical tools and techniques, such as process mapping, problem solving and Workplace Organisation (5S) used to improve manufacturing processes, have been adapted by Picme to improve administrative functions.

Picme has worked in areas such as Human Resources, new product development and sales order processing to deliver the following benefits:

• reduced processing time
• reduced time to market
• documentation right first time
• reduced departmental handover
• increased throughput
• reduced waste
• increase customer service levels