This is the first in a series exploring how Lean principles are often misunderstood in software organizations.
We begin with the most abused concept of all: “Eliminate Waste.”

The Intent Behind “Eliminate Waste”

In Toyota’s system, waste (muda) meant anything that consumed effort without creating value for the customer. It was about flow — keeping value moving through a system without friction. In software, waste rarely looks like idle hands or excess inventory. It’s invisible. It lives inside our calendars, Slack channels, and Jira boards.

The Modern Misinterpretation

Many companies equate “waste elimination” with “resource utilization.” They assume that if every developer is busy across multiple projects, efficiency must be high. In truth, this is the industrial fallacy — the idea that people are interchangeable parts on a production line.

When a developer is asked to “help on multiple products,” what actually happens is fragmentation.
Every context switch resets mental state, burns cognitive energy, and breaks flow.
The measurable result: slower cycle times, more defects, and lower quality.

Focus Is the Real Efficiency

The true meaning of eliminating waste in software is protecting focus.
A single hour of uninterrupted deep work often produces more value than an entire day of fragmented attention.
Focus continuity is the foundation of flow — the software equivalent of a smooth production line.
Task switching, meetings, and reactive communication are the hidden inventory clogging the digital factory.

Better Approach:

1. Limit Work In Progress per Person – Assign one or two priority products at a time. Avoid unrelated tasks that force context switching.
2. Time-Box Deep Work – Protect blocks of uninterrupted time for critical tasks, meetings outside these blocks only if urgent.
3. Align Dependencies – Ensure that tasks a person is working on actually benefit from continuity. Avoid juggling projects with zero overlap.
4. Transparent Prioritization – Make trade-offs visible. Leadership must decide what truly moves the system forward, instead of overloading individuals.
5. Team-Based Handoffs – For multi-product responsibilities, distribute ownership across small teams instead of forcing one person to span all contexts.

This is how Lean in software goes beyond theory: it reduces waste by enabling flow, not by overloading humans. The result is faster delivery, higher quality, and better learning.

Leadership’s Role

Leaders must stop treating capacity as fungible.
You don’t improve throughput by stretching people thinner; you improve it by removing friction so they can stay in flow longer.
Efficiency in software is not “doing more.” It’s doing one thing fully until it moves the system forward.