You probably wonder about the same sort of thing that is repeatedly on my mind — “How can we get rid of ridiculous inefficiencies?”. It is incredibly frustrating when we experience ineptness, especially as a customer.

One of my coaching client’s likes to tell the story of buying an iPad in Dubai one day and contrasting this with his experience in London the very next day. He claims, and my experiences support it, that six employees were involved in a single item purchase.

Ahmad walked into a well-known electronics store to buy an iPad, thinking it would be a straightforward — and quick — transaction since he was “mission” shopping for a specific purchase. Unfortunately, what transpired was anything but quick, and definitely not simple.

After being approached with “Hi Sir, how we can help you?”, he was directed to the person who handles the iPad section. To attempt to speed up the transaction, he told the salesperson exactly what specs he wanted and that he was ready to buy it. This is where complicated inefficiency led to a rollercoaster ride.

The iPad that he was ready to pay for was then passed on to another worker who wrote up the slip with all of the specs. (I wonder whether writing slips is all he does all day long...) Then another employee checked to make sure the slip was written properly. As a leadership specialist, the thought rolling through my mind is, if you don’t trust your employees to do their work correctly, then train them to succeed rather than add a layer of complexity and slow down the already sluggish process.

As he readies to pay, Ahmad is told that he has to take the slip across the store to hand over to another person who will ring up the sale. Begrudgingly, he makes his way to the cashier, thinking he would pay and walk out of the store.

But it’s not that simple. After paying he is told that he has to take a different slip and his receipt to the back of the store to collect his iPad. I doubt that Ahmad was hoping to get a workout during his retail experience of buying an iPad. Making his way out of the store, knowing nearly every employee by now, he is stopped at the door by one last person to check the receipt and item in the bag.

Did this experience really require six employees?

The very next day he was in London at the Apple store to buy another iPad (he has two kids) and he had the antithesis of the experience in the UAE. You could say the difference was as stark as night to day. After being greeted at the door, he told the sales guy which iPad he was after.

Here is the simplicity of what transpired. The sales guy grabbed one from the shelf and handed it to Ahmad to inspect. “I’ll take it” was followed by the swipe of the credit card on the spot and he was off. One employee, no slips of paper, no unneeded security rechecks. No inefficient steps.

Beyond his frustration, which each of us have experienced, Ahmad realised he too has inefficiencies within his workforce. You may have as well.

So, here is the core question you need to answer: Was this a product of a system or the people in the system?

Frederick Taylor would argue it is the people and their inefficiency that drives the creation of inefficient systems. In 1911, in The Principles of Scientific Management, which is considered to be among the first books on leadership, he writes, “... they [employees] deliberately work as slowly as they dare while they at the same time try to make those over them believe that they are working fast.”

In other words, employees try to get away with the least amount possible giving the impression of doing as much as possible. Not one of us would want to admit this about our own workforce, while we would argue it is true in others. Consider Ahmad’s indictment of the local electronics store and your personal experiences. So, it must be true.

Either way, it is a leadership problem and up to you as the leader to fix.

The writer is a leadership adviser and author of ‘10 Tips for Leading in the Middle East’ and other writings. Follow him on Twitter: @tommyweir.