Where growing businesses lose time between teams.

An order is confirmed on Monday, yet the warehouse cannot prepare it until Thursday. Sales believes the order has been handed over. Operations is waiting for a delivery address and an agreed specification. Everyone is busy, but the customer is still waiting.

Situations like this are a useful place to start an operational review. The problem may sit in the handover between capable teams rather than in the effort of any one person.

Follow one piece of work from start to finish

Choose a recently completed order, request, or project. Ask the people involved to reconstruct what happened, using timestamps, messages, and documents where possible. Record when someone worked on it and when it was waiting.

Look for repeated questions, missing information, and work that returns to an earlier stage. An order might take twenty minutes to check but spend two days waiting for a clarification. That distinction helps the team choose where to investigate first.

Agree what a complete handover contains

Bring the sending and receiving teams together around that example. Ask what the next person needs to begin without chasing additional information. For a customer order, this might include:

• An agreed product or service specification.

• A confirmed delivery location and contact.

• The promised date and any special requirements.

• A named person who can resolve an exception.

Keep the checklist short enough to use during a busy day. If a field rarely helps the next person act, question whether it belongs there. Decide how incomplete requests should be returned and how urgent exceptions will be handled.

Make the next action visible

A task marked “in progress” does not explain who needs to do what. Use statuses that reflect the work, such as “awaiting customer specification” or “ready for dispatch”, with a person responsible for the next step.

Agree when a delay needs attention and who can resolve it. In many cases, updating the shared tracker and clarifying responsibilities is a useful first test before considering a new system.

Test one change before rolling it out

Try the revised handover with one team or one type of order. Record a starting point, then compare the waiting time, the number of returned requests, and the questions people still need to ask.

Review the results with both teams after an agreed trial period. Keep the parts that help, remove unnecessary steps, and check for new delays elsewhere. A useful improvement makes the whole piece of work easier to complete, including for the person receiving it next.