1. Executive Summary
Partnered with the Town of Los Gatos to overhaul the engineering review workflow for complex land use permits. The existing system faced undefined delays, causing frustration for applicants and town staff. By conducting a full operational audit, our team identified that 41% of administrative time was "waste" and provided a roadmap to reduce total cycle time by 15% through Lean manufacturing principles.
2. The Challenge (Root Cause Analysis)
The permit review process requires collaboration between the Community Development Department (CDD) and Parks & Public Works (PPW). We identified three critical failure points:
The "Black Box" Effect: The primary software, Accela, was utilized inconsistently. Statuses were ambiguous (e.g., "Pending," "Processing," and "Review" were used interchangeably), making it impossible to track a permit's true progress.
Redundant Data Entry: Because Accela was difficult to navigate, staff maintained separate, manual Excel spreadsheets. Data was manually copied from Accela to Excel, creating a high risk of transcription errors and wasted labor.
Workflow Fragmentation: Handoffs between departments were manual and often undefined, leading to permits sitting in "limbo" without an assigned owner.
3. Methodology & Technical Approach
We utilized Industrial Engineering methodologies to dissect the process:
Swimlane Flowcharts: Mapped the end-to-end lifecycle of A&S and Grading permits to visualize handoffs between the Applicant, CDD, Building Dept, Fire Dept, and PPW.
Work Sampling Study: Moved beyond historical data to conduct live observations. We categorized staff activities into three distinct buckets:
Green (Value Added): Actual engineering review/analysis.
Yellow (Necessary but Non-Value): Meetings, emails, file navigation.
Red (Waste): Redundant entry, waiting for software to load, correcting errors.
Data Quantification: Analyzed a dataset of 100+ past permits to establish baseline cycle times and identify statistical outliers in processing speed.
4. Key Findings
The data revealed that the bottleneck was not the engineers, but the administrative framework surrounding them:
Administrative Bottleneck: The "Intake" and "Admin" stages suffered from 41% Waste Time. This was largely due to software lag (Accela performance) and manual re-entry of data.
Engineering Efficiency: Conversely, the technical engineering review was highly efficient, with only 12% Waste Time.
Status Bloat: We found dozens of redundant status tags in the system (e.g., "Inspection on Pending"), which confused the workflow logic.
5. The Solution (Recommendations)
We delivered a three-tiered improvement strategy based on Lean Principles:
A. Poka-Yoke (Error Proofing)
Concept: Prevent incomplete applications from ever entering the engineering queue.
Implementation: Proposed mandatory field constraints in Accela. If specific technical documents are not uploaded by the applicant, the system physically prevents submission, eliminating the "back-and-forth" email loops requesting missing files.
B. Kanban System (Visual Management)
Concept: Shift from a "push" system to a "pull" system.
Implementation: Designed a visual dashboard to categorize permits by priority.
Priority 1: Legally mandated deadlines (SB 330).
Priority 2: Standard Grading/A&S permits sorted by "First In, First Out."
C. Standardization & Automation
Concept: Clean data input for future automation.
Implementation: Created a Standardized Permit Data Collection Sheet. By forcing standardized inputs (rather than free-text notes), the Town can eventually use Python scripts or macros to automate the transfer of data between Accela and external tracking sheets.
6. Impact
15% Cycle Time Reduction: The proposed workflow changes targeted a 15% reduction in total turnaround time for applicants.
Elimination of Redundancy: The roadmap provides a path to eliminate the manual "double-entry" of data, reclaiming hours of administrative staff time per week.
Transparency: The streamlined status tags allow applicants to see exactly where their permit is sitting, improving community relations.