Intangibles

Many of the benefits of Lean are specific and tangible. Space savings, productivity gains, and inventory reduction all fall into this category.

Some of the benefits of Lean, though, are intangible. They are the things that are not clearly perceptible. How can you define the impact of a focus on problem solving? How do you measure a continuous improvement culture? What about an improved sense of teamwork or ownership of processes?

There is nothing inherently bad with intangible benefits as compared to tangible ones, except that they are harder to measure, and thus, hard to improve.

If you take a deep dive into your intangibles, though, you will likely find that many of them, or at least parts of them, can actually be measured.

“Morale” seems intangible, but can be measured by turnover, satisfaction surveys, or even the quantity of laughter in the company. Even things like beauty (facial symmetry), anger (volume of voice, heart rate, or shade of red on the cheeks), or leadership (response time of subordinates, or number of complaints in the suggestion box) can all be measured.

The point is to not immediately dismiss performance factors as intangible. Often, they just require a bit of effort to find a creative way to measure them. And, of course, being able to measure something is critical to being able to confirm that it has been improved.