CHAPTER 1
WHERE IS WHITE-COLLARWASTE HIDING? IN PLAIN SIGHT!
The numbers are shocking. Today’s knowledge workers waste a third of their day, every day, on activities that could be reduced, consolidated, or eliminated altogether. These efforts are misperceived as customer service, creative problem solving, or simply the unavoidable cost of doing business. But nothing could be further from the truth. This is “virtuous waste,” a catchall phrase for the types of well-intentioned error correction, review, rework, overservice, and needless variance that permeate virtually every aspect of knowledge work operations today.
Among the Fortune 500 alone, this virtuous waste squanders over $3 trillion in shareholder value each year. Currently, that’s roughly ...
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