Q 551. Compare the wastes of Transportation vs Motion. Provide at least 2 examples of each from both Manufacturing and Service sectors. What are the ways in which these wastes can be handled?

 

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Transportation waste and motion waste are two of the eight types of waste identified in the Lean methodology. Transportation waste is any unnecessary movement of goods or materials, while motion waste is any unnecessary movement of people or equipment.

Here are some examples of transportation waste and motion waste in both manufacturing and service sectors:

 

Manufacturing sector:

1. Transportation waste:

• Transporting raw materials from one warehouse to another without any value-adding process in between
• Shipping finished goods to a warehouse that is far away from the end customer, resulting in long lead times and increased transportation costs.

2. Motion waste:

• Unnecessary movements of workers to retrieve tools, parts, or equipment
• Multiple employees working on the same machine at different times, resulting in wait times and lost productivity.

Service sector:

1. Transportation waste:

• Sending unnecessary emails or documents back and forth between different departments within a company
• Employees commuting to work from distant locations, resulting in wasted time, money, and energy.

2. Motion waste:

• Excessive walking or searching for files, documents, or supplies in an office or workspace
• Repeatedly asking the same questions or seeking clarification due to unclear communication or processes.

There are several ways to handle transportation and motion waste:

1. Streamline processes and layouts to minimize the distance traveled by goods, materials, or people.
2. Use technology to automate or digitize tasks to reduce unnecessary movements and human error.
3. Adopt a "just-in-time" approach to inventory management to reduce the need for storage and transportation of excess materials or finished goods.
4. Implement a culture of continuous improvement and employee involvement to identify and eliminate waste at all levels of the organization.
5. Train employees on efficient and ergonomic work practices to minimize unnecessary motion and physical strain.

In the context of software development transportation costs can be equivalent to software requirements clarifications that are waiting to be responded to by the onshore team which has a considerable time difference from the offshore team. Motion examples would be scattered software development team members, who may have to do frequent movements to reach out to their team members for any clarification. Agile methodology recommends co-located teams to avoid this waste. Because this waste due to motion will create context-switching for the team member, as they move to get clarifications from their other team member. Context switching results if disconnected during work and getting back to the flow of work will need more energy and time. Dependency on interface partners of software development teams is another transportation-related waste. This involves the software development team waiting for the go-ahead from another software development interface partner. Lack of resources that are having multiple skills will also add to motion-related waste, for example, developers have to wait for feedback from testers or Business System analysts and so on. The agile methodology also kind of emphasize the need for an Agile team that has a strong composition of all needed skill, where a team can work as a cohesive unit.

In the case of manufacturing transportation wastes are the unwanted movement of materials across shop floor between machines, or between warehouses of different manufacturing locations. Motion wastes are the unwanted movement of workers on the shop floor, for picking up the raw materials or any other required inputs for their processing at their machine.

 

The lean framework recognizes seven types of waste, which include Transport, Inventory, Motion, Waiting, Overproduction, Overprocessing, and Defects (TIMWOOD).

Although motion and transportation share some similarities, distinguishing between them is straightforward.

Transportation Waste	Motion Waste
Resulting from unnecessary movement of "things” between process steps and spaces, such as tools, inventory, products, and/ or information.	Resulting from unnecessary movement of people that do not add value to the product or the process, such as such as walking, lifting, reaching, bending, stretching, and moving.
unnecessary movement of things and people due to poor planning, can cause avoidable work, exhaustion, damage, and time lost.
may result in machine wear-and-tear and product defects, and this can also lead to wasted time during the process.	may lead to worker exhaustion, negatively affecting their productivity, morale, work quality, and this can also lead to wasted time during the process.
Examples resulting in Transportation Waste: In office settings, examples of transportation wastes may include excessive or unnecessary movement of workers or employees within a facility or office space. In manufacturing setup, examples of transportation wastes may include relocating equipment from one construction site to another, returning excess inventory to a warehouse, inefficient floor planning of different teams coordinating on tasks.	Examples resulting in Motion Waste: In office settings, examples of motion wastes may include employees searching for files, walking between desk to communicate with colleagues or to the supervisor's office frequently to obtain answers to queries or seek approval. Within manufacturing units, instances of motion waste might consist of repetitive activities that fail to enhance customer value, obtaining materials, walking to retrieve tools or materials, and making adjustments to components after installation.
Mitigating wastes Effective value stream mapping can help in reducing both these forms of wastes.
Countermeasures to address transportation waste, measures can be taken such as introducing a U-shaped production line, refraining from over-producing work in process (WIP) items, and sending surplus stock to outlet store locations.Top of Form	Countermeasures for motion may include placing equipment near the production location, and putting materials at an ergonomic position to reduce stretching and straining, redesigned workspaces to enhance the work efficiency and quality of the workforce while emphasizing on health and safety levels.

 

 

Both Transportation Waste and Motion Waste being two of the eight wastes of lean, may exhibit the following differences:

 

Transportation Waste

Motion Waste

1)  Any movement of material and information between process steps, workstations and plants that does not add or create value.     2).  May cause information dilution resulting in loss or misrepresentation of vital facts. Damage of materials while in transit might also ensue thereby adding to further costs.      3) Examples: Service Industry: a).  Interdepartmental e-mail chains cc’d to more than required individuals with unnecessary attachments. b).  Multiple processing levels in a transaction processing unit. Processors, evaluators, QA1, QA2s etc. c).  Multiple escalations in a call centre rather than FTRs.    Manufacturing Industry: a).  Unnecessary movement of goods from warehouse to production floor and vice versa. b).  Ordering of raw materials from a distant vendor when nearby options were available. c).  Delivery routes that add to inefficiencies.

1).  Any movement of people and equipment within process steps, workstations and plants that does not add or create value.   2)  Occupational injuries might ensue due to stress and strain caused by overuse of certain muscles and body parts leading to too many sick leaves and absenteeism.  Early wear and tear of machinery could also be a consequence of this.    3) Examples: Service Industry: a).  Using way too many keystrokes and mouse clicks for simpler daily tasks rather using shortcut keys. b).  Taking time to search for vital information across multiple folders or systems. c).  Way too many unproductive meetings and discussions within teams.     Manufacturing Industry: a).  Taking time to find the right tool every time the need arises. b).  Unnecessary human and machine movements than required to finish a task. c).  Reaching for tools that are at a distance.

 

Identification of Wastes Arising from Unnecessary Motion and Transport:

The first step to eliminate inefficiencies arising out of these wastes is to identify the reason behind these wastes.  Poor layout of equipment and machinery, large batch sizes, absence of updated SOPs/Standardized Work, inefficient staff, non-calibrated machineries are one of the few primary reasons for both transportation and motion wastes.  Both these wastes can be detected through effective Value Stream Mapping and Gemba Walks.

 

How to Prevent Transportation Waste:

1.            Once inefficiencies are identified, implement 5S.  This would eliminate and minimize most of the wastes cropping up due to transportation.

2.            Optimize the usage of remote assistance tools for troubleshooting rather than physical addressal of mundane technical issues.

3.            Minimize or eliminate use of paper trails.  Maintain a central repository for knowledge sharing and lesson learned.

4.            Empower team members so that they are self-organized requiring minimal supervision and strive towards developing a team with T-shaped skills.  This would maximize the FTRs.

5.            Emphasize more on cellular layouts than functional layouts.

6.            Reduce batch sizes by implementing SMEDs.

7.            Use continuous flow where possible.

 

How to Prevent Motion Waste:

1.            Implementing 5S can eliminate wastes due to unnecessary motions.

2.            Develop Standardized Work and ensure team adheres to same.  This would eliminate inefficiencies arising out of unnecessary motions.

3.            Use VA/NVA analysis within processes to eliminate NVAs thus eliminating unproductive movements.

4.            Identify opportunities for automation and use appropriate automation tools.

5.            Ensure that the individuals and machineries are calibrated to avoid unacceptable work or scrap.

6.            Ensure that the team meetings and briefings are time-boxed effectively.

 

Conclusion:  Despite having these basic differences, both motion and transportation wastes to an extent go hand in hand.  The unnecessary movement of material and information caused by transportation waste more often than not results in unnecessary movement of workers and individuals too resulting in a motion waste.

Transportation waste is movement of the product, information, or customer if it not have any value addition to the system. It occurs between the steps and this is visible type.

 

Example:

 

Returning back of unused raw material to store in manufacturing may be transportation waste.

 

Trucks carrying items between two stations

 

In hospitals patient's sometime waiting and move from one chamber to another is a kind of transportation waste.

 

Unnecessary movement of public from one desk to another in govt. departments.

 

Motion waste

means unnecessary movement of man or machine. it is generally within step rather than between the process steps

 

Example:

 

Searching printer or searching for information or a device can be considered as motion waste. Stacking. repositioning, and clicking are examples of motion waste.

 

 Transferring information from one folder to another during consultation.

 

Walking through office space to check if paper or file delivered or not.

Pradeep Kandpal has given the best answer to this question. Other answers are also a must read to get varied examples of Transportation and Motion wastes.