Traditional Lean vs. Un-traditional Lean vs. Office Lean vs. Administrative Lean vs. Healthcare Lean vs. Banking Lean vs. Education Lean vs. Engineering Lean vs. .... - fragmentation and segmentation of a methodology is the beginning of the end. Actually this breakdown is a sign the methodology was not well defined or understood in the first place. So, let the death spiral begin!
Returning to the topic at hand - Dr. Deming said: "The present style of management is the biggest producer of waste, causing huge losses whose magnitudes can not be evaluated, can not be measured," (The New Economics, 2nd Edition, pg.22)
In many organizations, meetings are of very little value, while being insanely expensive. In the worst case, meetings are no help for the participants, no benefit to the company, and especially no value to the customer. Although, meetings are great entertainment to watch people, politics and power plays in action (or watching dysfunctional personalities on parade). But the time spent is not helpful to most everyone.
A culture of conducting effective meetings will go farther to improving efficiency and morale than any other single change.
Having the discipline to conduct effective meetings is a form of professionalism not found in many organizations. I'm talking about both organizational or individual professionalism.
I remember the story of one company attempting to reduce the length of meetings. They removed all the chairs in the conference rooms, and raising the tables to the height allowing people to stand and take notes. Standup meetings encouraged efficient meetings. Gotta love bold attempts at improvement.
Second on my management waste activity hit list is the volume of 'cover your behind' emails. But that is another topic thread.