This post is part of our business processes series, looking at the strategies and ideas implemented at Thomas Multimedia.

Having constraints and limitations are a good thing – they encourage creativity.

• What can be achieved in 3 weeks if a result is required?
• What can 4 people achieve instead of 20?

Constraints force us to focus on the core problem, rather than waste time on peripheral issues.

Who can honestly say that their greatest achievements were not the result of overcoming a challenge?

This post is part of our business processes series, looking at the strategies and ideas implemented at Thomas Multimedia.

When in doubt, follow the simple path – Keep it Simple

Adding a single element of complexity has a shock wave effect. All of a sudden, this shock wave is causing negative repercussions all over the project.

Keeping a project simple involves tough decisions, but it is infinitely harder, more costly and more time consuming supporting a complicated product.

It is easy to make something complicated; it’s much harder to cut through the crap and find out the better, simpler solution. In the long run it always pays off to invest the time to find the right solution to a problem.

This post is part of our business processes series, looking at the strategies and ideas implemented at Thomas Multimedia.

Create systems for every possible procedure that the business will encounter. This allows people with the lowest possible skills to follow a procedure and produce a predictable, consistent, high quality result.

Think of how McDonalds hires unskilled teenagers and efficiently produces a consistent range of products worldwide. As a former teenage employee of McDonalds I can tell you precisely why our otherwise rag tag team could produce a big mac, exactly the same, in a blistering time, over and over again.

1. Rack up buns on a tray, separating bottom and middle sections, and placing top (crown) on a large spatula
2. Insert lower and middle buns into toaster
3. After about 30 seconds, buns are toasted. Insert crown. Remove bottom and middle bun from toaster. Add cardboard ring around lower bun.
4. Lay as many meat patties as required (2 per burger) onto the double side grill and lower lid. Meat takes 42 seconds to cook.
5. Commence dressing middle and bottom buns with big mac sauce, onions, lettuce. 1x cheese on bottom, 2x pickles on middle.
6. Move tray to grill, before or as grill lid is automatically opening after its cooking time has completed. Add meat.
7. Get crowns from toaster, add to top, wrap and place in production chute.
8. Scrape grill, and repeat the whole process from step 1 again.

I haven’t worked inside a McDonalds since about 2003, and yet the process to create every burger of the day is still stuck like glue in my head. Clearly the head office has recently found further ways to optimize this process, now pre-cooking and using warmers to keep the meat, and dressing the burger at order time rather than using a… Read more