Improvement Insights Blog

In Kitchen Confidential, Anthony Bourdain describes the essence of a chef’s station, which could apply to any lean cell design.

“I’m Jay Arthur, author of “Lean Six Sigma Demystified” and QI Macros [software].

“I was reading Anthony Bourdain’s book Kitchen Confidential, which is about the high-end cooking business out there, but I found a passage that I think applies to Lean Cell Design. I’ll read that to you:

‘As a cook, your station, and its condition, its state of readiness, is an extension of your nervous system – it is profoundly upsetting if some other cook or, God forbid, a waiter – disturbs your precisely and carefully laid-out system. The universe is in order when your station is set up the way you like it: you know where to find everything with your eyes closed, everything you need during the course of the shift is at the ready at arm’s reach, your defenses are deployed. If you let your [mise-en-place] get run down, get dirty and disorganized, you’ll quickly find yourself spinning in place and calling for backup.’

“Isn’t that the essence of Lean Cell Design? To make a workplace so that everything’s right where it should be, so you don’t have a lot of unnecessary movement? So you’re not tramping around going everywhere to do everything? You get the idea.

“Years ago, I did a video about my kitchen which is set up as a Lean design: the refrigerator, the stove and the sink, and the closer those are together, the quicker and more easily we can make food; the farther apart they get, the more and longer it takes.

“So that’s my Improvement Insight for this week: Design your lean workspace right so that everything’s right where you need it. You don’t have to go trekking around to get stuff. Keep it clean and organized. Now I wish I could say I did a great job with that, but I don’t… but you get the idea, right?

“Let’s create workspaces that are super tight, super clean and efficient. Let’s go out and improve something this week.”