Learn how to create a home office workspace with Lean Six Sigma Tools!

The number of people looking for remote jobs has increased severely in the last couple of years but why is this happening? Even before the pandemic situation, many people were working from home. And now, during the COVID-19, it became a world trend.

Some people prefer the home office workspace, others might prefer the in-person job and there are those who are happy with both of them as a hybrid job or just one or another.

Thus, in this article, you will learn how to increase productivity to deliver better results with a lean office from the comfort of your home. Catch up on some tips to organize your home office workspace with lean!

• What’s the difference between a Remote job, Home office, and hybrid job?
• Which type of work is better for you? 
• Why having a lean office is productive? 
• Is the Lean Office a type of minimalism? 
• How to organize your home office workspace with Lean Six Sigma?

What’s the difference between a Remote job, Home office, and hybrid job?

Would you like to work from home? This type of work is a trend. However, it works for you? Not all workers can work from home and there are many reasons for that.

A remote job is a type of job that the person works wherever he wants. They can work from home, work and travel and the most important thing is the work you are doing, not the place you are in. It became very famous due to COVID-19 and there are people who travel a lot while is working.

Thus, by getting a remote job you can become a Digital Nomad (a person that travels a lot, there’s no way back “home” because the world is your house and works digitally).

The Digital Nomad most of the time has a Lean office in the hotel or works in some coworking space only with his laptop. This lifestyle has much to offer for open-minded people.

However, the home office is the place where the person is working. People who are working from home need a home office to do the job even if it is not so good for them. Lean Six Sigma can improve productivity and help you out by getting everything in his place.

Nevertheless, there is also the Hybrid job. This type of job offers the opportunity to work at home and also at the company. Some enterprises advise doing that because it’s important to make physical contact sometimes.

There are things that only work at an office in a company, so those types of jobs are not possible.

Which type of work is better for you? 

Nowadays, it’s not hard to choose because most jobs offer different types of opportunities and you just have to find the better one, a job that fits you well.

Think about the money you will earn, the place where you going to work, the problems you are going to face, if it is possible to work at your home or if you really would like to work and travel around and talk to people who have experience in working from home.

Why having a lean office is productive? 

Lean Six Sigma is a methodology that seeks to increase the profitability of companies through the improvement of their processes. Thus, Lean six sigma is an excellent methodology to use on everything even in your office. It’s an efficient way to improve productivity by making a lean office.

Applying Lean Office is necessary for every company that wants to optimize its administrative processes and eliminate waste related to these processes.

However, it doesn’t matter if the office is at the company or in your house, you can use lean tools anyway.

If you apply the 5s method you will reduce waste at the office and the Value Stream Map (VSM) helps to identify the waste. By reducing waste you can improve your productivity.

Leverage results with ebook the 7 Quality Tools!
With this eBook, you'll learn how to use tools that will help you improve quality in any company:

• Flowchart

• Control Letters

• Ishikawa diagram

• Check Sheet

• Histogram

• Scatter Graph

• Pareto's chart

In it, you will also find definitions of the concept of Quality in the view of today's gurus. Plus a surprise that we prepared for you. A kit with DMAIC tools, to help you even more at the time of application. Do not miss this opportunity and download this material right now.

Is the Lean Office a type of minimalism? 

Lean Office is the application of principles of lean thinking to non-manufacturing and physical activities, which implies the office environment or administrative areas of the company. The flow of value, in this case, consists of the flow of information and knowledge.

Minimalism is about living only with the things we really need, simplicity, removes everything that distracts us from doing the necessary, reduces waste, shows what is really valuable for our lives, and is also an elegant way of living.

Although not everyone can live like this because sometimes it’s hard to give up the things we are comfortable with. There are tools to adapt to a minimalist lifestyle. Thanks to Lean it can be easier.

Lean six sigma helps to create a minimalist workplace.

As the American author, Ralph Waldo Emerson said: "To be simple is to be great."

How to organize your home office workspace with Lean Six Sigma tools?

There are many Lean Six Sigma tools that you can use to organize your home office workspace, such as:

1- Value Stream Mapping (VSM)

The Value Stream Map is a simple diagram of all the steps involved in material and information movements to assist customers in their buying progress. It can be designed in different phases and reveals opportunities for improvement.

Thus, you can use it to identify the waste in the office. You need to map this process, separating activities that add value to those that do not add value to information and reports that seek to meet expected demand.

2- 5s Method

The 5S Method is a quality program that aims to improve the work environment and productivity, based on the five Japanese senses:

• seiri - sort - organize;
• seiton - set in order - orderliness;
• seiso - shine - cleanliness;
• seiketsu - standardize;
• shitsuke - sustain.

3- DMAIC for Time Management

Agile DMAIC is a technique applied in the union of operational excellence methodologies, Lean Six Sigma (LSS), with project management, Scrum, in search of solutions to problems with the quality and productivity of processes and projects.

Agile DMAIC works with the goal of identifying and addressing potential problems, enabling quantitative management, and assessing the use of Scrum practices for each process.

• Define: The moment for planning, establish all premises and processes clearly, and draw up the project contract.
• Measure: Know and observe the current scenario and know the possible causes of the problem in order to establish the project foci. 
• Analyze: Identify the root causes of the problem with facts and data.
• Improve: Present a solution to the problem and evaluate its implementation.
• Control: monitor the results and establish maintenance to ensure that the results are not lost.

4- Continuous improvement

"In Japanese, Kaizen means continuous improvement. This word suggests an improvement that involves all managers and workers, also inferring the meaning of low expenses. The Kaizen philosophy suggests that our way of living, both in the professional and personal environment, should be focused on a constant effort to improve. "

(Masaaki Imai - Lean Management Guru)

Kaizen is the culture of continuous improvement and you should always improve your workspace, make it clean and healthy for living. Remember to keep only the necessary.

5- DRAFT method

This method stands for:

Delegate It

Respond to It/Process It

Archive-It

File It for follow-up

Throw it Out

It’s a helpful tool to organize the stuff you don’t know what to do with.

Would you like to know more about Lean Six Sigma?

Lean Six Sigma is a methodology that seeks to increase the profitability of companies through the improvement of their processes.

Thinking about you and your career, we, at Think Lean Six Sigma, created a FREE Yellow Belt training in Lean Six Sigma.In this training, we will introduce you to the DMAIC method and all its 5 steps, namely: "Define, Measure, Analyze, Improve and Control.

With this course, you will be able to develop small improvement projects within your area of expertise and work with Green Belts and Black Belts in support of the Lean Six Sigma program.

Have you ever thought about being the agent of change within your organization? Click on the image below for more information and become a Yellow Belt, for FREE!