Improving Laboratory Productivity after Workload Increases

Has your QC Lab grown naturally over a period of time from a small lab into a bigger lab due to a growth in business demand? Are your employees under a lot of stress with never ending emails and phone calls from production and supply chain looking for sample approval? This expansion in activity is great news for the business but is most likely causing operational problems in your lab. BSM have developed Lean methodologies and solutions specific to lab environments that streamline lab operations to give you the edge. With our help you can substantially improve measurable performance and reduce lead-times & costs.

Typical practices found in labs

In BSM, what we typically see before a QC lab embarks on Real Lean Lab project is each lab group has their own unique, supervisor dependant operating system. Typically this results in:

• Volatile daily workloads (both for the overall lab groups and the individual analysts)
• No defined target lead times
• No defined sequence of work
• Undefined roles for analysts
• Limited visual management, short interval control and Key Performance Indicators,
• No Key Performance Indicators on display
• Some resourcing & structure misalignment to the workload requirements

Best practices implemented by BSM

After implementing a Real Lean Program each lab will now follow a systematic operation of Levelling, Flow & Standard Work. The benefits of this approach are:

1. Levelled and predictable amounts of work launched by the lab each day
2. Target Lead-times set for all QC testing workstreams
3. Defined Flow sequences structured to meet the defined lead-time agreements
4. Optimised standard roles which are balanced, fair and repeatable day to day for each analyst
5. Visual management of all the labs workloads & tasks with daily touch points
6. Key Performance Indicators on display and resourcing now aligned where necessary

The BSM Real Lean Lab solution will minimise non value add activity and maximise throughput and velocity in your lab. The benefits of these improvements will significantly increase productivity, reduce lead-times, reduce costs and give a more consistent & predictable performance with greater empowerment for laboratory personnel and improved customer service levels. This is especially true in labs that have substantially increased in size without changing their operating processes. If you would like more information please contact us and we can set up a call.