Schools Programmes : Thinking Efficiency

Thinking Efficiency - Doing More with Less

Do you need to spend less money in your school and to make sure that what you do spend is well spent? And would you be interested in creating better teamwork across your organisation into the bargain? Then read on.

The Thinking Efficiency Programme objectives are to find real cost-saving solutions to real organisational problems, to engender a continuous improvement culture and to promote better communication throughout the school.

Nobody likes having to make efficiency savings. But with school budgets expected to come under even more pressure, this programme makes a virtue of necessity. Thinking Efficiency is a unique solution designed to help schools become more efficient and save money. This programme provides a means for efficiency saving ideas to be generated from within the school, by a self-activating, cross-school team, at very little cost. The team(s) once trained, is/are encouraged to be self-sustaining and look for continuous improvement for the on-going benefit of the school.

Adding value is central to lean thinking, and this can be adapted to any type of organisation. Often omitted from business studies teaching, these commonsense yet counter-intuitive ideas can have a dramatic effect on school efficiency.

The programme is NOT just for the SLT, but involves the school assembling a cross-cutting team of willing participants taken from all areas of the school such as teachers, middle leaders, SLT, support staff, finance, catering, cleaning and site management staff, and it can include governors, parents – and even students, as a way of promoting the student voice.

Participants are introduced to simple, yet very powerful concepts that challenge commonly held views. Practical tools are provided to enable the team(s) to analyse processes and identify inherent waste and to find creative ways to eliminate it. Participants use their personal knowledge of how systems really work in the school and are given the tools and the forum to share their ideas and recommend changes.

After the initial training, self-managing teams would be assigned specific problems to tackle and solve. SLT might make these selections based on the School Improvement Plan or other organisational priorities, and deadlines would be confirmed for the presentation of the solutions back to SLT.

Thinking Efficiency helps to identify the real value-adding activities. By using ‘value stream mapping’, participants will be able to eliminate the ‘7 Wastes’ and create ‘flow’ in work, all with perfect quality. Using less is the ultimate objective – less human effort, less resource, less space, less time and less cost.

Concepts are introduced in a lively, fun and engaging way with practical exercises reinforcing communication, problem solving and team working skills. To be successful and demonstrate its importance to the school, the Thinking Efficiency team(s) needs to be given full support from SLT. Their investigations might take a few months to work through and find the right solution.

So if you want real cost-saving solutions, a continuous improvement culture and better communication throughout your school, Thinking Efficiency may be for you.