A while back I worked for an international TV network. They had a central database for all their TV programming and just about everyone in the organization used it. And had been using it for a very long time. Too long. To look up the information for a single program you had to sit there and wait for a full 30 seconds!

To look up the information for a single program you had to sit there and wait for a full 30 seconds!

The first time I used the database I thought it was broken or I must have misunderstood how to use it, but then I learned that, apart from a computer, the virtue of patience was required in order to use it. Well, if I'm honest, that’s one of the virtues I still need to work on, so instead of waiting I started poking around.

Turns out, the system they were using was rather basic and I knew of some modern tools that could improve the search time. Very soon I had the system yielding “instant”* results for searches and I got it to work 500 times faster!

I’ve got to tell you though, that the best part wasn’t that I got the system to work faster. The best part is that now all those people don’t have to waste their lives away waiting for the tool to work.

After doing some quick back-of-an-envelope calculations, it turns out that in a year the organization lost about 1,600 hours just sitting there waiting for the system to show results. That’s the same amount of time it takes to get an Associate’s Degree! 1,600 dead hours of not creating value, not helping customers, not getting new business.

Plugging the leaks in our businesses is a vital task of business leaders, because even if it’s a small leak, when running the numbers, it can be pricey not to plug it! What could you and your business do with an extra 1,600 hours?

* about 70ms if we want to get precise ;-)