Lean Library

Library becomes a lean machine by Morgan Jarema:

"I spent parts of three days looking for that book," Hoyles recalled. "On the fourth day, I found it. I called the patron and he told me he'd gone out and bought it."
...
In November, library employees, who are responsible for checking in from 4,000 to 10,000 returned materials at a time, were asked to help reduce the reshelving time, which could be as long as two weeks.

The average time now is 36 hours, though most materials can be found on rolling carts in the section where they belong the same day they are returned.

Related lean thinking idea: 5s. More lean manufacturing/thinking articles.