R.W. Tomlinson is committed to a program of continuous improvement and Value Stream Solutions — a continuous improvement consulting firm — has been hired to assist the company in reaching these goals.

Continuous improvement is a process of removing waste from office, administrative and manufacturing processes. It was developed by Toyota Motor Company, and is now used by companies all over the world to help streamline their business processes.

The continuous improvement process is known as LEAN. It is a strategy for growth and improvement that does not require additional resources. LEAN uses a system that visually maps each process, and then uses these maps to identify areas to be streamlined and made more efficient.

R.W. Tomlinson has identified three areas within the company where LEAN principles will be applied -- estimation, the Power Road garage and accounting invoice payables.

When using LEAN process management the employees doing the work are the experts, and they improve the processes. The LEAN consultant is only a guide through the process of waste elimination. The employee’s role is to come up with ideas and implement the solutions.

Since this is a continuous improvement process, changes are monitored and assessed over time. Employees are always looking for ways to improve their work processes. If a suggested change is an improvement it is added to the current state of the process, and reviewed for further improvement in the future.

LEAN is based on the belief that no process is perfect and everything can always be improved.