Reduce the Units of Input Not Producing Output

Reduce units of Input (I) available but not producing Intermediate Cost Drivers (ICDs). This action makes Input levels more directly variable with the quantity of the ICD by reducing the amount of the available Input that is wasted or idle. For example, an employee (I) might produce one subassembly (ICD) per day. During that day, the employee spends a total of one hour waiting for parts for the subassembly. If the Company could eliminate that one lost hour of the employee's work day by providing parts in a more timely manner, the Company could reduce the number of employees (I) needed to produce the same subassembly (ICD) by 1/8th.

F. Speed the Process

3.
Increase the pace

No.	Industry SIC	Year	Notes
1	2000	2004	In production, high performing companies strive to increase efficiency by doing things such as shortening the time needed to change dyes in a production line. They manufacture products more frequently, thus improving their delivery times and lowering their delivery times and lowering their finished-goods inventory. These methods are borrowed from lean-manufacturing programs.
2	3571	1986	To get the product to market as quickly as possible, IBM used to buy the PC's key parts from outside sources, mostly in Asia.
3	3672	1986	Quadram used to make all of its plug-in accessory boards for the IBM PC at its plants. Then it moved operations to Japan. Now, it's moving assembly ops back to the states, but to contractor manufacturers. "We get much faster turnaround by using a U.S.
4	3674	1991	Cypress began tracking parts electronically and created a software routine that shuts down the inventory system if parts sit more than 200 days. Cypress gradually sped up the timing until the limit reached just 10 days. Record for on-time shipments rose from 65-90%.
5	4512	2005	Delta Air Lines has confirmed plans to shut Song, its innovative, low-cost airline subsidiary, and has pledged to incorporate many of Song's best features into Delta's main U.S. operations. Song, launched in April 2003, was Delta's response to JetBlue, which cut in on Delta's terrain with its low prices. Song became a laboratory where Delta tried out innovations, including reducing the amount of time aircraft spent on the ground between flights, a simplified fare structure, and flexible employee work rules that lowered costs. Those strategies have since been applied to improve Delta's operations and customer service.
6	5411	1998	Clerks at Waremart begin ringing up a second customer while the first is still writing her check, increasing throughput 35%.
7	5900	1996	Retailers who must be fast to market should gauge early customer appeal, with tests in different regions to account for regional variation. One successful high fashion retailer air-ships all items that have sold better than expected during tests–sometimes half of all deliveries.

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