Is your documentation process full of waste? There’s an app for that

Catch a Technical Author on the wrong day, and you hear them complain about spending hours tracking down a Subject Matter Expert who’s perpetually in meetings, or having to rewrite the same section three times because the source information kept changing.

In a manufacturing environment, you’d see them as symptoms of waste in the process: the kind of things that cost organisations actual time and money.

Back in 2018, we interviewed Stella Crowhurst on the Cherryleaf Podcast, about how she had used Lean methods to develop documentation within an Agile development environment. At that time, Stella was Content Strategy Director at ‎Worldpay; she’s now Vice President, Product Management at Mastercard.

Recently, her approach inspired us to build a new AI tool that enables documentation teams identify and tackle these workflow inefficiencies. This information enables teams to identify the areas where AI solutions might provide the biggest benefits.

The app draws on Lean Methodology, a discipline traditionally rooted in manufacturing. It brings a rigorous, structured approach to analysing and eliminating waste in documentation workflows.

What is value stream mapping for technical documentation?

Value stream mapping is a Lean technique. It visualises the steps involved in delivering a product or service, and identifies where value is being added, and where it isn’t.

When applied to technical documentation, it helps teams see the entire documentation lifecycle more clearly. That includes gathering information, writing, review cycles, publishing, and the end-user experience.

The goal is to make that lifecycle more effective, modern, and better integrated with the wider enterprise. And, as a result, have more efficient processes, improved cycle times, and better quality.

Analysing waste

At the heart of this approach is waste analysis. This means identifying all the activities in your workflow that consume resources without delivering value. Waste, in Lean terms, is the opposite of value: anything that doesn’t result in a tangible or intangible benefit for the customer.

The 8 Lean wastes, adapted for technical communication

Although Lean waste analysis was originally designed for manufacturing, it translates surprisingly well to documentation workflows. It also fits naturally into Agile development environments.

The tool is based on a waste matrix originally developed by the Lean Product Development Consortium (see the EU research project report). It has been adapted into eight categories specific to technical documentation:

1. Over-engineering / over-authoring
   • Adding unnecessary detail, using overly complex language, or writing beyond what users actually need.
2. Waiting
   • Delays caused by SME unavailability, waiting for information, approvals, or system processing.
3. Transportation
   • Information redundancy, copying content between systems manually, or duplicating effort across poorly integrated tools.
4. Over-processing
   • Unnecessary workflow steps, or writing from scratch when reusable content already exists.
5. Inventory
   • Backlogs of unfinished or abandoned projects, or content waiting on resources that haven’t materialised.
6. Motion
   • Time lost to unnecessary meetings, chasing stakeholders, or other non-productive activity.
7. Defects and corrections
   • Rework caused by inaccurate source data, poor style compliance, or failure to meet organisational standards.
8. Unused employee creativity
   • Failing to capture and reuse institutional knowledge, or poor onboarding that slows writers down.

How the tool works

The tool acts as an intelligent assistant. It guides technical writers through a structured process of identifying, scoring, and prioritising waste in their day-to-day work.

Step 1: Identify the waste

The writer describes a current frustration or bottleneck in plain language. The tool maps it to one of the eight waste categories. For example: “This sounds like ‘Waiting’ due to SME availability.” Writers can review and override these suggestions. They can also upload existing records of waste they’ve already logged.

Step 2: Score it

Each waste is rated on four dimensions, scored from 1 (low) to 4 (high).

These are:

• Frequency (how often it occurs),
• Impact (effect on quality or delivery),
• Detectability (how easy it is to observe and measure), and
• Avoidability (how feasible it would be to prevent with better processes).

Step 3: Analyse and recommend

The tool generates a strategic summary based on the waste identified. This includes spotting patterns and suggesting specific AI-powered solutions to address the root causes. Writers can download the analysis as a PDF report.

Step 4: Prioritise for action

The tool calculates a priority score for each item and presents a ranked table showing where to focus improvement efforts first. The results can be exported in Excel, CSV, and PDF formats.

Why this matters for Technical Writers

Documentation teams are often seen as a support function rather than a strategic one. That means inefficiencies tend to go unexamined and unaddressed.

This tool gives documentation managers and Technical Authors a systematic way to surface, quantify, and communicate the waste in their workflows. That makes the business case for process improvement far easier to make.

It also reframes how writers think about their own work. Teams can approach documentation as a value stream. That it deserves the same continuous improvement attention as any other part of the product development lifecycle.

Applying Lean thinking to your documentation process can reveal significant improvements, whether you’re embedded in an Agile team, managing a large content operation, or working solo.

For more information about this app, training and consultancy services to support your technical documentation work, contact us.