How do you know that you have identified a good waste to work on? In the December, 2001 issue of Fast Company magazine, Tom Peters made an observation that I have been using in War on Waste projects since I started in 1985. Peters observed that good ideas came from someone who was “pissed about something.” In his perception, things only happen in the world when someone is angry about the status quo. Martin Luther was angry about 95 theses, or 95 issues with the Catholic Church. This anger led to the Protestant Reformation.

Similar situations in which discontent has led to significant change, even transformation, have happened throughout history. In Peters’ view, and in mine, just about every major business improvement occurs for the same reason, because someone is angry about something. What we’ve noticed during the War on Waste is that if someone is angry about a part of his/her job, then there is usually a waste associated with that.

In one company, three teams in a particular class were rolling along nicely with good wastes that needed to be eliminated. At the fourth table, the team was just sitting there not talking. So I went over to them and asked what was going on. The informal spokesman said that no one wanted to contribute. I asked him if he did? He said sure, but he wasn’t going to go it alone. I said I understood. Out of the blue I asked him, “Does anything in your job, piss you off?” “Of course,” he said. “I get really mad when I have to change a setup to run a rush job (or hot job) that is still sitting around days later.” Just at that time, the CEO came in. He said they had solved the hot-job problem a couple of months ago. I pointed out that it didn’t sound like it. I gave him a yellow, ruled pad and directed him to go out with the team and write down all jobs still sitting in the shop that were hot two weeks ago. The hot jobs had red tags. After 15 minutes, the CEO and the team came back with a page full of stalled hot jobs. Apparently, the problem had not been solved. The team now had their project and it turned out to be a good one because the CEO was now firmly engaged and committed to make it work.