Page 88 - summer2016

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The Lean Farm motorized cart. Getting every whiz-bang new
by Ben Hartman gadget just adds unnecessary expense, mainte-
Chelsea Green Publishing nance and clutter.
Overproduction is another form of waste.

The standard American paradigm for suc- You are not being more efficient when you pro-
cess is to keep getting bigger. That’s the theory. duce something your customer doesn’t want. It
In practice what seems to happen most of the is easy to slip into the mindset of producing what
time if not always, is a company or organization you want or think your customers should want
keeps getting bigger until it is too big and stupid instead of what they really want. If you have a lot
to live. Then they get bailed out by a government of extra, you are not giving them what they want.
which is also too big and stupid to do anything One of Toyota’s leading efficiency experts made
right. an interesting, counterintuitive observation. In
Ben Hartman has another idea which has his experience, mass production is not cheaper
worked well for him and the government hasn’t or more efficient than small-scale production.
had to bail him out yet. He is a small farmer in Another very key point for the lean farm is
Indiana who has no desire to get bigger and goes labor. The goal is not to go as cheap as you can
to some effort to avoid it. Instead he looks for on labor. With labor especially, you get what
ways to do things smarter and more efficiently. you pay for. Good labor doesn’t have to put
He elaborates on a process for doing this that up with cheap, and they won’t. High employee
makes a lot of sense. turnover is very expensive and very inefficient.
One of the first steps is to get rid of stuff. Low-quality labor breaks things. Low-quality
Even things that seem like they might be useful labor does it wrong the first time and has to do
someday. Specialized tools are an example. You it again. . . and again. That’s not cheap.
think you might need it someday. Well, have you On a related note near the end Hartman
needed it for the last three years? No? Get rid of includes one of many gems of wisdom from
it. Multi-use tools that will do the job adequately Wendell Berry: “We have made it our overriding
are all you need. A huge clutter of tools just ambition to escape work, and as a consequence
makes it harder to keep track of everything and have debased work until it is only fit to escape
easier to lose anything. Then put those tools in from …”
a good place near where they will be used, not Do we not need a sense of purpose? Where
all in one central location where they will never do we derive that sense of purpose if not from
be used. meaningful work? I like to kick up my heels on
Hartman is fairly ruthless about tossing the beach from time to time as much as anybody
but to do that exclusively for the rest of my life
High extra stuff. It takes up space better used for would be boring and pointless. This Thumbs Up
other things. It takes time and energy just to
employee store it and remember where it is. In general book is loaded with practical advice and gives

turnover if it doesn’t add value your customers want, it the reader much to think about.
Review by Tim Boyd
is very is just dragging you down. Some people think
that having the latest and greatest technology
expensive is the key to success. It isn’t. Hi-tech items are
and very high maintenance and break. Some basic things

inefficient. are good, like an appropriately-sized tractor or
88 Wise Traditions SUMMER 2016 Wise Traditions