Open the second shutter so that more light can come in.

Johann Wolfgang Goethe

In Chapter 1 we said that the customer is the central focus for any organization, and that marketing was too important to be left to the marketing department; everyone in the organization should be vitally interested in marketing their organization.

We are all now competing in a global market place. Make no mistake about it. There is nowhere to hide; national boundaries and governments no longer provide protection against overseas competitors.

As you have progressed through this book, you will have realized that it is not possible to separate service from manufacturing. We cannot think of any manufacturing organization that is not also competing in the level of service that it provides. In a global market place first-class service, in the sense of delivering the right product, in the right quantities, at the right time, and with good post-delivery follow up, is taken for granted.

The challenge is to eliminate non-value adding activities. Any activity and any input that does not add value for the customer merely adds to expenses and a lowering of profits. We have to be ruthless in the way we look at all costs. Obviously some non-value adding activities, such as completing regulatory returns, will by necessity occur. Your aim should be to establish what is adding value and what is not adding value, and what is necessary and what is not. If an activity is not adding value and is not...