Mohammed Nihad

American university in Baghdad

Introduction to business (BUS – 101)
Dr. Farid Nabti

Lean management and its effectiveness

The lean concept is a very beneficial system that can be applied to any business or

production process from manufacturing to marketing and this methodology relies on delivering

value to the end customer, eliminating waste which are things or people that do not give any

value to the end-product, and continuous improvement for work process and people. Lean

concept encourages to share the responsibility and leadership roles as it relies on two main pillars

which are continuous improvement and respect for people. This article will state the origin of

this methodology, its benefits, and if there are any challenges when trying to implement it to an

organization.[1]
 Lean methodology was first noticed in the late 1940s, when Toyota put the foundations

of Lean manufacturing, they aimed to reduce processes that don’t bring value to the end product.

By doing so, they succeeded in achieving significant improvements in productivity, efficiency,

cycle time, and cost-efficiency. Thanks to this notable impact, Lean thinking has spread across

many industries and the term Lean was made up by John Krafcik (currently CEO of Google’s

self-driving car project Waymo) in his 1988 article “Triumph of the Lean Production System”.

Lean management was not created in a moment. Instead, it is evolving gradually, thanks to many

observations and people's desire for continuous improvement. [1]

Lean methodology has developed through time into five main principles [1], and they are:
 Identifying the value.
 Mapping the value steam or path.
 Flow creation.
 Establishing the pull.
 Continuous improvement.

Every company strives to offer a product or a service that is ready to be paid for by the

customer, thus, the company needs to identify and add value defined by the customer. The

company now must map the workflow of its process to identify the steps that bring value, to

identify the waste, and to know the productive people that are responsible for evaluating and

improving the process. Then the company must keep the workflow as smooth as possible

knowing that some processes require cross-functional effort between different teams and ensure

the harmony between those teams. And the company should also study the market to create a

pull system that is effective, and this can only happen by creating a stable workflow. And after

all of this, there must be continuous improvement as problems can happen and team meetings

must be held to come up to a solution that can improve the overall process and productivity.[1]
References: -
1. KARAIVANOV, DIMITAR. “What Is Lean Management? Definition & Benefits.”
Kanban Software for Agile Project Management, 21 Feb. 2018, kanbanize.com/lean-
management/what-is-lean-management.