As with most people, I have a few pet peeves, but one of my biggest has to be with people who don’t know how to merge in traffic. It may be a ramp onto a crowded expressway or the merge caused by a lane closure. No matter the reason, the point at which traffic merges seems to be up for debate.
I am firmly in the camp that the merge point should be at the point where one lane disappears. At that point, we all go into zipper formation, taking turns to enter the highway. You go. I go. You go. I go. You go. I go. It’s simple, efficient and easy. In fact, people tend to be pretty courteous at the merge point.
(Except in the Washington, D.C., area where merging is a contact sport.)
Many others, though, merge long before that point. Consequently, the lane that will eventually disappear tends to have a lot less traffic in it. Those of us who believe you should merge at the point the two lanes actually merge then fly by the standing cars. Yes, I feel guilty, and often people are a little ticked off about it.
But if you don’t merge when the two lanes actually do merge, when should you? When you first notice the sign saying “Lane Closed Ahead?” Or when there’s an open space? Those decisions seem particularly arbitrary.
I think my way is more efficient. If everyone merges at the last moment, we are using the amount of space available more efficiently. You don’t pack a box only on one side, do you? And those people who merge early actually lengthen the slower lane, and by creating multiple merge points cause more decisions to be made, which slows things down.
We face similar circumstances in our business and construction lives. The people around us often have a different idea about how to get the work done-the best way to proceed. If everyone is operating under different parameters, we become less efficient and create friction between workers. There is only one way to overcome this kind of problem: systems and processes.
Every business and every part of a business needs to have defined systems and processes so that people know how the work can get done. It’s a simple way of communicating to the entire staff that “we will all merge at this point.” It matters less if you choose a less efficient merge point than it does that everyone agrees to use the same merge point. Agreement is more efficient.
After that system is in place, you can begin to look for ways to improve it. But the most important step is to get the system in place. That your sales staff communicates with your production staff in the same, consistent way is the most important improvement you can make to your production hand-off process. Once that’s in place, start looking for ways to make it better.
Now that we’ve all agreed on the best way to merge, can we also do something about people who stand in the middle of entryways, concourses, paths and other traffic areas? That’s probably my biggest pet peeve.
