Search results for "LEAN PRODUCTION"

Not so different altogether: Putting Lean and sociotechnical design into practice in a process industry

2021

Purpose: The shop-floor organization under lean production (LP) has been hotly debated for about three decades. As this organization concept leaves considerable room for interpretation, the content of lean-inspired changes can vary widely. This paper pleads for a contingency view of how LP is implemented and how the outcomes of lean-inspired changes rely on users’ interpretations of the concept in particular production contexts.Design/methodology/approach: A case study was conducted in two large Norwegian chemical plants. Data from the observations and interviews were supplemented by interviews with top managers in 2017 and 2018. The first author also followed a management audit in one plan…

Il contesto istituzionale nipponico e l’evoluzione della “lean production”

2006

A Viable System View of the Japanese Lean Production System

2011

We highlight the main characteristics of lean production and we analyze them using a viable-systemic perspective. Doing so we consider the lean production with its osmotic interactions with the Japanese business system and we create a framework which highlights the key relations which are essential for the viability of the system.

Decoding the Japanese Lean Production System according to a Viable Systems Perspective

2012

The increase in the complexity and variability of the business environment, due to constant and rapid changes in markets, calls for more flexible and effective production systems. Of the most valuable production systems, the Japanese lean production system (LPS) is the best known and studied, but is still not the most widely applied with success outside Japan. The reason for the low level of success of lean production outside its native country is the lack of understanding of the strong interactions which hold between enterprises and business systems. In order to fill this gap in our knowledge, we investigate the systemic interactions according to the Viable System View. To develop our anal…

Relationship between employee involvement and lean manufacturing and its effect on performance in a rigid continuous process industry

2015

Relationship between employee involvement and lean manufacturing and its effect on performance in a rigid continuous process industry DOI: 10.1080/00207543.2014.975852 Juan A. Marin-Garciaa* & Tomas Bonaviab Received: 1 Aug 2013 Accepted: 30 Sep 2014 Published online: 04 Nov 2014 This research aims to empirically test the effect of employee involvement on lean manufacturing (LM), and the effect of LM on production outcomes. Employee involvement is operationalised through four related variables: empowerment, training, contingent remuneration and communication. The effects are tested by recording management perceptions in a different industrial sector from those usually studied in previous re…

From Business System to Supply Chain and Production in Japan. Lean production and its roots in Japanese business culture

2009

The Japanese business environment has been studied for many years by researchers and business operators from all over the world. The Japanese culture created a business climate that is different from other industrialized economies. Gerlach defined the Japanese economy as “alliance capitalism” , an expression, which better than others, represents the relational nature of the Japanese society and business system. It is not by chance that the manufacturing and management techniques, later defined as “lean” by MIT authors, were born and raised in Japan. In this dissertation I will attempt to explain why and how these approaches are linked with the Japanese culture and the Japanese business envi…

Managing adoption by cultural development: Exploring the plant level effect of a ‘Company Specific Production System’ (XPS) in a Norwegian multinatio…

2020

Purpose: ‘Company Specific Production Systems’ (XPS) aim to adopt ‘best practice’ across plants within a company. A pertinent issue in the literature involves the constraints in the possibilities of realising such an adoption. This paper addresses to what extent and how a Norwegian multinational succeeded in adopting the XPS in its local plants. Design/methodology/approach: A Brazilian, Chinese and Norwegian plant of a Norwegian electro-chemical company were studied from 2017 to 2019. Our data consist of the results of the plant’s assessment performance program, combined with interviews and observations at different organizational levels. Findings: The MNC had largely managed to adopt the X…