Skip to main content

Effiecency


Timeless lesson on how consultants can make a difference for an organization. . ...
Last week, we took some friends out to a new restaurant, and noticed that the waiter who took our order carried a spoon in his shirt pocket. It seemed a little strange.

When the busboy brought our water and utensils, I noticed he also had a spoon in his shirt pocket. Then I looked around and saw that all the staff had spoons in their pockets..

When the waiter came back to serve our soup I asked, 'Why the spoon?'

'Well,' he explained, 'the restaurant's owners hired Mckinsey & Co., to revamp all our processes. After several months of analysis, they concluded that the spoon was the most frequently dropped utensil. It represents a drop frequency of approximately 3 spoons per table per hour.. If our personnel are better prepared, we can reduce the number of trips back to the kitchen and save 115.27 man-hours per shift.'

As luck would have it, I dropped my spoon and he was able to replace it with his spare. 'I'll get another spoon next time I go to the kitchen instead of making an extra trip to get it right now.'

I was impressed. I also noticed that there was a string hanging out of the waiter's fly. Looking around, I noticed that all the waiters had the same string hanging from their flies. So before he walked off, I asked the waiter, 'Excuse me, but can you tell me why you have that string right there?'

'Oh, certainly!' Then he lowered his voice. 'Not everyone is so observant.That consulting firm I mentioned also found out that we can save time in the bathroom. By tying this string to the tip of you know what, we can pull it out without touching it and eliminate the need to wash our hands, shortening the time spent in the bathroom by 76.39 percent.'

'After you get it out, how do you put it back?'

'Well,' he whispered, 'I don't know about the others, but I use the spoon.'
Labels:

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

The Sinking Ship

There were three ships which were nearby when the Titanic sunk. One of them was known as the Sampson. It was 7 miles away from the Titanic and they saw the white flares signaling danger, but because the crew had been hunting seals illegally and didn't want to be caught, they turned and went the opposite direction away from the Titanic. This ship represents us and people like us if we are so busy looking inward at our own sin and lives that we can't recognize when someone else is in need. The next ship was the Californian. This ship was only 14 miles away from the Titanic, but they were surrounded by ice fields and the captain looked out and saw the white flares, but because the conditions weren't favorable and it was dark, he decided to go back to bed and wait until morning. The crew tried to convince themselves that nothing was happening. This ship represents those of us who say I can't do anything now. The conditions aren't right for it and so we wait until cond...
Post a Comment
Read more

Be Happy (A True Story)

Around twenty years ago, I was living in Seattle and going through hard times. I could not find satisfying work, and I found this especially difficult, as I had a lot of experience and a Masters degree. To my shame, I was driving a school bus to make ends meet and living with friends. I had lost my apartment. I had been through five interviews with a company and, one day between bus runs, they called to say I did not get the job. I went to the bus barn like a zombie of disappointment. Later that afternoon, while doing my rounds through a quiet suburban neighborhood, I had an inner wave - like a primal scream - arise from deep inside me, and I thought, "Why has my life become so hard? Give me a sign, I asked, a physical sign, not some inner voice type of thing." Immediately after this internal scream, I pulled the bus over to drop off a little girl. As she passed, she handed me an earring and said I should keep it in case somebody claimed it. The earring was stamped me...
Post a Comment
Read more

Never Judge a Book by its Cover

As she stood in front of her primary 5 class on the very first day of school, she told the children an untruth. Like most teachers, she looked at her pupils and said that she loved them all the same. However, that was impossible, because there in the front row, slumped in his seat, was a little boy named Koko Bassey. Mrs. Thompson had watched Koko the year before and noticed that he did not play well with the other children, that his clothes were messy and that he constantly needed a bath. In addition, Koko could be unpleasant. It got to the point where Mrs. Thompson would actually take delight in marking his papers with a broad red pen, making bold X's and then putting a big "F" at the top of his papers. At the school where Mrs. Thompson taught, she was required to review each child's past records and she put Koko's off until last. However, when she reviewed his file, she was in for a surprise. Koko's primary 1 teacher wrote, "Koko is a bright...
Post a Comment
Read more