What is Lean?

Why choose Lean?

• Customer value: Lean puts the customer at the centre of every process, so products and services fit what the customer needs.
• Lower costs: recognising and removing waste reduces operating costs.
• Shorter lead times: work flows better, which raises productivity.
• Higher quality: continuous improvement makes products and services better.
• Engaged employees: Lean builds a culture of continuous improvement and respect for people.

How did the term originate?

Lean was not invented behind a desk. It grew over a century of manufacturing, from Detroit to Japan.

In the Lean Six Sigma Green Belt training you learn to apply Lean to an improvement project in your own organisation.

Henry Ford. In 1913, in Highland Park, Michigan, Henry Ford introduced the moving assembly line for his Model T and made cars affordable for the masses. The problem was not flow but variety: every car was the same, and when the world wanted variety, Ford’s system could not provide it.

Toyota. When Kiichiro Toyoda, Taiichi Ohno and others at Toyota looked at this in the 1930s, and more intensely after the Second World War, they saw that a series of simple innovations could combine continuous flow with a wide range of products. They reworked Ford’s thinking into the Toyota Production System: efficient and flexible.

Womack and Jones. Only in the 1990s did this way of working get a name. James Womack and Daniel Jones described the secret behind Toyota’s success in their book The Machine That Changed the World and called it “Lean”. A simple word for a deep concept.

What does Lean mean?

Lean covers principles and methods that help organisations work more efficiently and effectively. These are the main elements:

• Management philosophy: a way of working and thinking to manage processes.
• Eliminating waste: recognising and removing waste in processes.
• Respect for people: treating employees with respect and encouraging them to do the right things.
• Customer focus: the customer decides how your product or service best solves their problem, and with that the process behind it.
• Asking questions: observing without judgement instead of jumping to an answer or solution.
• Working more effectively: work becomes more enjoyable, simpler and more effective.
• Solving problems: a shared method to tackle problems.
• Striving for perfection: for the customer and for the organisation.

How does Lean work?

Lean rests on five principles. You go through them in this order, and then start again:

1. Value for the customer: who is the customer and what do they value?
2. Map the value stream: make the process visible, for example with a Value Stream Map.
3. Create flow: remove obstacles and focus on the steps that add value.
4. Pull instead of push: start the process only when the customer asks for it.
5. Strive for perfection: keep improving, for the customer and for the organisation.

This is how you set up processes with as little waste as possible. Read more about each principle in the 5 basic principles of Lean management.

Lean organisation

“Just as a carpenter needs a vision of what to build to get the full benefit of a hammer, Lean Thinkers need a vision before picking up our Lean tools,” says James Womack. That vision gives direction to change and makes sure every effort serves the goals of the organisation.

Womack and Jones stress that a Lean organisation starts with three questions:

1. Purpose: which customer problems do we want to solve to reach our goals? A clear purpose helps to set priorities and create value that counts.
2. Process: are our processes valuable, reliable, available, flexible and well connected? That takes a critical look at every value stream, to remove waste and create flow.
3. People: do employees take responsibility for their processes and actively contribute to improvement? A Lean organisation puts people first and encourages engagement and ownership.

The power of Lean

Lean makes processes more efficient, more customer focused and more effective. It helps organisations not only to improve, but also to grow and adapt to changing needs. Whether you optimise a production line, streamline customer service or tackle waste in a care process: Lean gives you the tools and the mindset to maximise value. Start with the right questions, because the road to perfection begins with a single step.

Lean and Six Sigma

Lean strives for flow and value. Six Sigma strives for a stable process with as little variation as possible. Together they complement each other: with the DMAIC model of Six Sigma and the five principles of Lean you improve processes in a lasting, measurable way. That is Lean Six Sigma.

One of our participants perhaps put it best: