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What is Lean?
Lean is a philosophical set of practices to eliminate waste to increase the efficiency of the manufacturing process. This is an approach that businesses use to maximize customer value. Lean has many complex elements and there are four identified notions:
Being Lean- Lean as a fixed state or goal.
Becoming Lean- Lean as a continuous change process.
Doing Lean- Lean as a set of tools or methods.
Lean Thinking- Lean as a philosophy.
What is Lean Thinking?
Lean philosophy applied to manage projects is called Lean Thinking. It is a management framework that aligns business process with customer value with the help of creative practices. The Lean Thinking purpose originally was to help in the manufacturing process. It was designed by the Japanese automaker Toyota and its guidelines are still used for modern Lean manufacturing. The main focus of this mindset is to provide customer value while improvising business activities. There are two pillars of Lean:
Value of People
Continuous Improvisation
What are the principles of Lean Thinking?
There are five principles that help to fulfill the objectives of Lean Thinking:
Value- This principle signifies that the organization must understand the needs of the customers and what gives them value.
Value Stream- After identifying value, the processes are defined that will help to achieve that value.
Flow- This is the step where the waste or obstacles are eliminated from the process to improve it.
Pull- Removing waste and resolving issues slows the time to market which is actually good as there is no unwanted stack in the inventory. Customers take whatever they need from the organization and there is no piling in the inventory.
Perfection- The Lean mindset objective of attaining perfection in the process is only possible after the organization has gone through total Lean transformation.
What is the Goal of Lean Thinking?
What is the goal of Lean Thinking? It is to provide customer value by continuously improving the business process. To achieve this goal the organization has to learn to balance the strengths, weakness, capabilities and outcomes of the individual employees and their activities. Helping to form a collaborative environment so that the work can be done efficiently is the aim of Lean. Lean transformation helps the organizations to remove blockages, eliminate waste, and communicate the process clearly. It also aims to develop a culture where there is mutual respect for everyone.
Conclusion
Companies going through Lean transformation must practice the principles of Lean and works towards the goal of Lean Thinking which is to provide customer value. This approach is basically idealistic and needs thorough knowledge and understanding about Lean. Its implementation helps to increase the overall efficiency of the organization. There are SAFe courses that provide detailed guidelines about Lean management framework. Acekube is a platform that avails such courses for professionals that can help in Lean transformation.
FAQS
1. How lean thinking drives efficiency?
The purpose of Lean Methodology itself is to bring perfection in the work process that ultimately results in efficiency. To achieve this Lean invests and spends money on resources that help to create value for customers. It is a way of thinking that optimizes the flow of the process by eliminating wastes and removing obstacles to create a customer satisfactory product.
2. What is the impact of lean thinking on productivity?
Lean Thinking is all about delivering efficiency. The practices and processes used in Lean help to improve the flow, remove waste, and induce collaboration in the work culture. This ultimately results in quality improvement, reduction in costs, and increase in productivity. Broadly Lean Thinking impacts four areas of work in a positive manner:
Increases the quality of the product.
Reduces Lead time by slowing time-to-market.
Reduces cost of inventory as there is no piling of stocks.
Carries sustainable operations as it eliminates any waste from the process.
3. How to align lean thinking with customer value?
Lean Thinking philosophy states that the product should provide value for customers. Various practices and principles are applied to the process to align lean thing with customer value. Any activity that does not serve customer value is claimed to be a waste or irrelevant to the process. To fulfill this purpose the company performs value stream mapping that defines the flow of the process. Value stream mapping also helps to identify and eliminate waste, communicate the steps better and eases collaboration.