Friday, July 18, 2008

Lean Transformation Strategies

Lean transformations that effectively improve the culture and performance of
an enterprise use an integrated approach across people, business processes,
and technologies. Based on the survey responses of over 800 manufacturing
professionals, the Aberdeen Research Group has identified specific strategies for manufactures to deploy at every stage along the Lean journey. Survey results show that firms enjoying Best-in-Class performance share several common characteristics which include:

  • Lean processes are standardized across the enterprise and are based on best practices.
  • Executive ownership of Lean initiatives exists, and these executives have worked to establish Lean Centers for Excellence across the enterprise.
  • External consultants are utilized to set expectations, help establish best practices, and train the appropriate number of internal champions.
  • Lean Scheduling software solutions are used to standardize processes and support decision makers in real-time.

Aberdeen has identified required actions for enterprises at every point of the
Lean journey. In each case, the required actions have been validated by the 800
survey respondents and shown to improve KPI performance in defects, first
pass yield, on time delivery, and throughput. Actions to reach Best-in-Class include:

  • Use external Lean domain experts to begin training, set expectations and establish best practices for pilot Lean initiatives.
  • Establish executive ownership of local Lean initiatives and establish a pilot Lean Center of
  • Excellence to support best practices across the enterprise.
  • Use manufacturing operations management capabilities to enable Lean tools that support Lean Scheduling and Execution initiatives.

Are you Best-in-Class?