This month’s issue of the CIMx® Newsletter focuses on the sustainability of green initiatives in manufacturing.  Reducing overall waste affects all aspects of the business world.  Moving towards a paperless manufacturing environment enables a healthier environment, and encourages a healthier bottom line year after year.

Lean and Green

The idea of creating a ‘green’ shop floor is a daily issue in the news.  In order to remain competitive, as well as being more environmentally sustainable, customers are moving towards a paperless manufacturing operation.  Implementing a paperless manufacturing system improves operations by eliminating non-value added tasks and reduces your overall waste consumption by decreasing the amount of paper used on your shop floor.

So, the question is, are you thinking Lean and Green?

A recent article developed by the Cutter Consortium entitled, “Being Green, a Duty and an Opportunity” surveyed a host of companies on how they plan to make their  IT and IS processes green.  When asked to what extent does your organization encourage transforming their business processes to be paperless? 12% of the respondents answered they have a plan to begin investigating a paperless operation in 2008.  Are you among the 12%?  Another question asked respondents if there were any policies that encouraged installation of software for which the goal is to reduce overall waste.  15% of the respondents answered they intend on creating a plan in 2009.  Again, does this include you?  The following charts illustrate additional data found in the article.

To what extent does your organization have policies that encourage transforming its business processes to be paperless?**

To what extent does your organization have policies that encourage installation of software for which the main goal is to reduce your organization’s overall waste? **

Moving towards a paperless system encourages a green environment and can be implemented with little disruption to your everyday operations.  A paperless system is a low-risk initiative that will encourage a more environmentally friendly operation with a high Return on Investment (ROI) which you can realize in one year or less.  In certain instances, low risk is associated with an initial installation in 30 days, with training and full roll out happening in less than six months.  A paperless manufacturing system enables you to be both lean and green with proven repeatable savings, year in and year out.

** 2008 Cutter Consortium survey – used with permission