A Strategy of Resilient Systems Thinking to Sustain a Lean Organizational Culture: Promoting Conceptual Change in Lean Class

摘要

Lean manufacturing systems has afforded organizations significant gains in productivity, profitability, and overall performance. However, the resulting inter-industry diffusion of lean has revealed obstacles to effective lean implementation. The literature documents the unsatisfactory results of unsuccessful implementation attempts. The literature also links these unsatisfactory implementation results to suboptimal lean behaviors, poor lean leadership and culture, and continuous improvement training. In light of these challenges, this paper suggests a framework that facilitates the conceptual change from anti-Lean to Lean thinker in order to avoid identified conceptual causes to lean failures. This research identifies approaches for engineering managers to avoid lean culture problems by developing a strategy to change the mentality of students/employees and, in turn, facilitate lean manufacturing success. We propose an implementation strategy focused on education, but discuss broad applicability to other industries in which managers seek to sustain lean implementation.