The Lean Three Ms
The Lean Three Ms are: Muda, Mura and Muri.
The Japanese word „Muda“ (waste) is the most well-known of the Three Ms. The remaining two refer to „Muri“ (overburden) and „Mura“ (unevenness).
All three are aimed in Lean Management to be eliminated because they often lead to inefficiency, poor quality, breakdowns and stress, and are present in any industry and type of work.
"MUDA" - Waste
Waste is anything that does not bring value to the customer. Customers are not willing to pay for it.
Waste Examples
- Waiting for materials, machine set-up, approvals, etc.
- Breakdowns, defects, bad quality
- Unsold seasonal items piling up in storage
- Too complicated processing
- Double-work in various employees or teams, often unintentional
- Unused skills and ideas from employees
- Overstock of supplies that expire
- Employees searching for files across multiple drives
Examples of Lean Solutions for Waste Identification and Elimination
- Value Stream Mapping
- Lean Consumption and Lean Provision Mapping
- Spagheti Diagram
- 5S
- 5 Whys
- Standardized work
- Mistake-proofing (Poka-Yoke)
- Just in Time
- Pull System / Kanban
"MURA" - Unevenness, Inconsistency
Mura refers to fluctuations or irregularities in processes, demand, etc. When the work is unequally distributed, it often leads to waste (Muda).
Examples of Unevenness
- Production lines idle in the mornings and overload in the afternoons
- One machine operates at twice the speed as the remaining
- Rush orders placed regularly at the end of the month to meet targets
- Incoming customer service calls spike in the afternoons
- Accounting being processed at month-end only
- Stores and storages receive large deliveries once a week instead of daily
- Promotions causing demand spikes followed by drops
Examples of Lean Solutions to Unevenness
- Standardized work
- Load leveling (Heijunka)
- Small Batch Production
- Pull System / Kanban
- One-Piece Flow
- Buffering with Supermarkets
- Aligning production to Takt Time
- Visual Management
- Mistake-proofing (Poka-Yoke)
- Root Cause Analysis (5 Whys)
- Cross-training
"MURI" - Overburden, Unreasonable
The Japanese word Muri refers to overburdening people, equipment, or systems by placing unreasonable demands on them.
Examples of Overburden
- Employees working for long hours without rest
- Workers lifting heavy parts all day without assistance
- Equipment operating beyond its capacity or maintenance schedule
- Machines running at max speed continuously
- Tasks being assigned without proper tools or training
- Unrealistic production quotas
- One person doing the job of two due to understaffing
- Tight deadlines with scope creep
- Surgeons scheduled back-to-back surgeries without break
Examples of Lean Solutions to Deal with Overburden
- Standardized work
- Visual Management
- Robust process design
- Load leveling (Heijunka)
- Staff training
- Roles and responsibilities
- Supportive leadership
About the Author:
Iveta Grüttner
Iveta is passionate about business transformations and about enabling continual improvement cultures benefiting everyone. She is an experienced senior management consultant, change agent and certified Six Sigma Master Black Belt and Lean Sensei (Coach). Iveta has been leading global transformations, and teaching and coaching hundreds of Lean Six Sigma professionals, incl. many Master Black Belts, worldwide.
- +420 728 496058
- iveta@CI4e.com
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