When an Established Process Goes off the Rails
Tim Gebauer
Thrift, re-commerce & e-commerce expert passionate about finding new homes for previously loved items. Open to short term assignments.
Eventually, things surface.
A crazy example was cash handling at a retail store. This all started when a manager went out on an emergency so I ran his store for a few days. Near closing time an assistant said that it normally took an hour or more to count down drawers and she couldn’t stay that long. This was a store with three registers. It took less time than that to do a dozen or more drawers at Walmart, puzzling.?
She walked me through their process so I could take care of closing out. It was a Rube Goldberg system with plenty of useless steps. There was nothing in the software or accounting rules requiring what she described. Their morning setup was also unnecessarily hard.?
I checked with one of the other store managers to make sure I wasn’t missing something. He was as puzzled as I was.?
After not counting down a drawer for over a decade, it took half an hour by using tried and true methods.?
What took a while was cleaning up cash in the safe. They had multiple bags and trays for, well, hard to tell. There was loose change everywhere, multiple bank bags with paper-clipped cash inside also did not appear to have a purpose. I rolled coins, minimized loose change, and consolidated bills.?
A previous manager had set this system up and no one questioned it. Even with all of the extra steps, they didn’t regularly verify the safe and total cash on hand. (In case you aren’t in retail, that’s very basic)
The next morning cashiers got their tills for the day and simply had to verify the money was correct. They were thrown by the change in routine but we managed to get the store open.?
After the safe money was sorted out, accounting was looped in. Cash was hundreds of dollars off, and it turned out they chronically reported wrong numbers and had wrong bank deposits. No wonder. (That led to another discussion.)
The next evening counting down registers and accounting for everything went faster and smoother. The assistant acted like I was violating several of the ten commandments.?
I hadn’t been in the role for long and had already changed a few equally puzzling things my popular predecessor had set up. (maybe a post for another day) The negativity didn't surprise me.
Slightly oversimplified process:
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When the store manager got back we went over the changes; and more pushback. No one could give me a why behind the extra steps they were taking, it was just how it was done and they felt must be done.?
It can be hard to radically change a process that has been done one way for years. No matter how good or bad. Southwest Airlines might be learning that lesson.?
They were so ingrained in this system I had to pull out the “because I said so card”.?
It is amazing how hard it can be to work simply.?
Eventually, the light bulb came on. After some practice, it took fifteen minutes to count drawers, prep them for the next day, make up the bank deposit and verify the safe. Mornings became a simple verifying recount.?
A few lessons learned:
Even good change can be hard.?
There isn’t always time to build a consensus, solicit input and make everyone feel good about a change. In this case, company assets were not accounted for, considerable labor expense was being wasted and the process did not follow company standards.?
Some processes have to be the law across the enterprise.?
Controls and communication systems avoid these kinds of issues.
Most importantly, the manager had previously mentioned how long it took him to wrap up and go home each day. I had chalked it up to inexperience, assuming he would get better over time. I could have listened more intentionally and asked questions earlier.?
The result:
Once everything was firmly in place, managers got out quickly each evening. Cash shorts and overs were obvious and reported quickly. Not surprisingly they mostly went away.?