Author
Independent operations consultant
Running the desk
I prepare, the accountant files. The working notes for my 2025 return reconcile income to the ledger, list what is claimed and what is not, and leave two questions open for the person qualified to answer them.
Mara Lindqvist · Independent operations consultant · · 3 min read
Running the desk
A one-person business has no colleague to ask. The files have to answer instead. Here is the checklist I use before relying on any sentence in my own records, and what changed when the files started answering back.
Mara Lindqvist · Independent operations consultant · · 4 min read
Running the desk
Three credentials held, one in progress, each with a different renewal rule. The ledger that keeps them straight, the calendar habit that stops them lapsing, and why a lapsed credential stays in the record.
Mara Lindqvist · Independent operations consultant · · 3 min read
Study
I am studying for the Certified Operations Practitioner examination alongside client work. Here is what the handbook requires, how I weight my study, and how I prove what I already know so I only study what is left.
Mara Lindqvist · Independent operations consultant · · 3 min read
Working with clients
My rate card says net 30. The Halvard letter says Net 14 from the invoice date, with a 40% deposit on signature. Both are true, and the letter wins for that engagement. Here is how I keep the two from getting mixed up.
Mara Lindqvist · Independent operations consultant · · 3 min read
Working with clients
At the Halvard kickoff the operations director asked whether the review could recommend a warehouse system. The letter says it cannot. Here is how I answered, and why the answer is an offer rather than a no.
Mara Lindqvist · Independent operations consultant · · 3 min read
Working with clients
What a client is buying when they sign a fixed-fee review: the deliverables, the milestones the fee is invoiced against, how the price is built, and what happens when the work needs to change.
Mara Lindqvist · Independent operations consultant · · 3 min read
Constraints and flow
A plan without a measure is a wish. A working plan names the constraint, the measure that will show the change, the owner and the review date, and it is piloted on one shift before it is rolled out.
Mara Lindqvist · Independent operations consultant · · 3 min read
Constraints and flow
The same total work moves faster in small batches because each item waits less for its batch to complete. A growing queue is the earliest sign that arrivals are outpacing the constraint.
Mara Lindqvist · Independent operations consultant · · 3 min read
Constraints and flow
The constraint is the step whose capacity bounds the whole flow. Find it by where work queues, then follow the five steps in order: identify, exploit, subordinate, elevate, repeat.
Mara Lindqvist · Independent operations consultant · · 3 min read
Process mapping
Three measures that sound alike and mean different things. Cycle time belongs to a step, lead time to the whole flow, touch time to the hands. The gap between the last two is where waiting hides.
Mara Lindqvist · Independent operations consultant · · 3 min read
Process mapping
A current-state map is a record of the floor today, not a tidy version of the written procedure. Here is how I build one in a depot: walk the process, time the steps, mark the queues, and confirm it with the people doing the work.
Mara Lindqvist · Independent operations consultant · · 3 min read