Digital Efficiency Consulting Group – Resources
Small improvements create real change.
Complexity doesn’t show up as a single problem. It shows up as thousands of tiny choices, templates, exceptions, and workarounds. LEGO learned the hard way that uncontrolled variation turns into a tax on your people, your systems, and your supply chain. This post gives you a fast ‘13,000 Parts Audit’ to find the mess and remove one version that’s slowing everything down.
When performance wobbles, ‘innovation’ can turn into panic buying with a bigger budget. LEGO’s near-collapse is a reminder that too many initiatives create operational whiplash and hidden work. Use a simple 1–3 scorecard and a stoplight portfolio to separate real strategy from shiny distractions.
Standardization doesn’t kill creativity. It kills rework, confusion, and the endless “which version do you use?” conversations. LEGO’s turnaround shows how constraints can make systems faster and teams more inventive. Use the 3-layer model to standardize inputs, default workflows, and exceptions without turning your process into bureaucracy.
The fastest path to relief isn’t adding more work, it’s stopping the right work. LEGO’s turnaround started with one simple question: what can we stop doing? Steal a 30-minute Stop-Doing Huddle agenda to cut low-value reports, meetings, and approvals and protect the time you reclaim.
Side quests feel exciting until they eat your margins and your attention. LEGO recovered by cutting distractions and protecting the core operation that actually paid the bills. Use a Distraction Disposal checklist and a simple sunset script to reduce tool sprawl, exceptions, and portfolio clutter.