Concerning Xtreme Customer Service (XCS)

Jim,

I enjoyed your column on XCS. Your examples show a lack of customer focus and a lot of non-value added activity. In essence, you are taling about the lack of Lean activities. Lean (and its sister Six Sigma) is best summarized by Taiichi Ohno (one of the founders of the Toyota Production System - aka Lean) in 1988..

"All we are doing is looking at the time line from the moment a customer gives us an order to the point when we collect the cash. And we are reducing that time line by removing the non-value-added wastes."

I received my Six Sigma Black Belt through a paper company around 2000. There still continue to be very few people in the paper industry pursuing Six Sigma diligently, and even fewer looking at Lean.

I have a M.S. in Paper Science and Engineering and 20+ years of experience with various paper companies. I have left the industry to pursue helping another company eliminate waste, focus on the customer, and improve service.

It is a shame that the paper industry continues to focus on short term profits and not the long term goal of servicing the customer....

Things a customer wants:

1) Solve my problem completely.

2) Don't waste my time (hassle factor) Hassles occur when providers ignore the customer's value of time.

3) Provide exactly what I want.

4) Deliver value where I want it.

5) Supply value when I want it.

6) Reduce the number of decisions that I have to make to solve my problems.

(From James Womack and Dan Jones, Lean Solutions.)

Regards,

(name withheld by request)

Kentucky
USA