If there's one Japanese word you should know, it's muda. Muda means waste, any human activity that uses resources but creates no value: mistakes that require correction, excess inventory, steps in processes that are unneeded, waiting around for someone to do their job, things and services that don't meet the needs of the customer.

Muda. It's everywhere. Muda. Muda. Muda. Muda. (無駄    無駄   無駄   無駄)

There are eight types of Muda:

1. Defects
2. Overproduction
3. Transportation
4. Waiting
5. Inventory
6. Motion
7. Overprocessing
8. Skill

When was the last last time you tried to identify the areas of your recruiting process that contained waste? What have you done to eliminate those wasteful processes and outcomes?

It all begins with the identification of the value stream.

In recruiting, the value stream is the set of all of the actions required to deliver a new employee into the hands of a hiring manager. Simply identifying all of the tasks required to accomplish this simple objective is enough to expose staggering amounts of Muda. The tasks can be grouped into three general areas:

1. Tasks that unambiguously produce value
2. Tasks that Create no value but are unavoidable with current technologies (Type 1 Muda)
3. Tasks that create no value and are avoidable (Type 2 Muda)

Fairly obviously, Type 2 Muda can be eliminated immediately while Type 1 Muda may require some sort of investment or patience).

Tomorrow, Flow and Pull.

John Sumser © TwoColorHat. All Rights Reserved.
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