Transport – unnecessary movement of items, equipment, materials, or information
NHS hospital (bed availability): Patients moved between wards purely to free beds, not because their clinical needs changed — creating extra portering, delays, and risk of lost information.
Inventory – holding more stock or work‑in‑progress than is needed
Retail fashion chain: Excess seasonal clothing stored in back rooms that never reaches the shop floor
Motion – unnecessary movement of people due to poor layout or process design
Manufacturing plant: Operators walking across the factory to fetch tools because workstations aren’t standardised.
Waiting – delays between steps where people, products, or information are idle
Software development team: Developers waiting days for code reviews before progressing to the next sprint task.
Overproduction – producing more or earlier than the customer requires
Catering company: Preparing large batches of food “just in case”, leading to waste at the end of events.
Overprocessing – doing more work than is required or adding unnecessary steps
Banking/finance: Re‑entering customer data into multiple systems due to poor integration.
Defects – errors, mistakes, or rework that require correction
Call centre: Incorrect customer details logged, leading to repeat calls and complaint escalations.
Skills – underutilising people’s abilities, ideas, or expertise
Tech startup: Junior engineers excluded from product design discussions despite having innovative solutions.
