THE MANAGEMENT OF LEAN AND AGILE ORGANISATIONS

The Management of Lean and Agile Organisations

Table of Content

SECTION 011

Rationale1

Evolution And Future Of Lean Manufacturing2

Lean and Mass (Traditional) Production strategies3

SECTION 024

Organisational, Operational And Human Barriers Successful Implementation Of The Lean Manufacturing Strategy4

SECTION 035

SECTION 0410

Kaizen11

Just-in-Time12

Total Quality Management (TQM)13

Six Sigma14

Conclusion15

References16

Appendices18

Table 0119

1.What are the aims of the assignment?19

2.What are the objectives of the assignment?19

3.What learning opportunities can you explore within the assignment?20

4.What do you think will be your greatest challenge and how do you plan to tackle it?20

Operations and Quality Improvement Strategies

SECTION 01

Changes are rapidly occurring in the economy. The modern economy is no longer based on mass production and consumption of goods and services. In this changing environment, producing more - however efficiently - is not necessarily better (Fornell et al., 2008). Hence, the current trend toward downsizing in UK firms may increase productivity in the short term, but the downsized firms' future financial performance will suffer if repeat business is dependent on labor-intensive customized service. In order to compete in this new economy companies must have:

quality beyond the competition;

technology before the competition; and

costs below the competition (Watson, 2005).

In other words, many companies must strive to be better, faster, and cheaper than their competitors. These are some of the characteristics of a “lean” enterprise.

Rationale

Traditionally, marketers have evaluated companies by assessing their marketing strategies. This strategy includes the firm's product or service, price, promotion, and distribution, as well as its target market of customers. More recently, some marketers are assessing a fifth element of the marketing mix, which is process. The process includes a series of steps. Step 1 involves looking at the company's internal and external environment. It is at this step that competition is considered as an external environmental variable, and the company itself is analyzed for its internal strengths and weaknesses. During this step, external and internal benchmarking is done, which aids the company in becoming lean. Step 2 in the process establishes the direction or objectives of the company. For example, where is the company going, and what are its objectives? Step 3 in the process develops a plan to achieve the desired objectives. The central focus here is how to better deal with competition. Step 4 in the process is the implementation of the plan. In order to implement organizational strategy successfully, managers must have a clear idea of several diverse issues. Step 5 in the process is the control phase, which focuses on monitoring and evaluating the entire process in order to improve it and ensure that it is functioning properly.

Evolution And Future Of Lean Manufacturing

Lean production makes optimal use of the skills of the workforce, by giving workers more than one task, by integrating direct and indirect work, and by encouraging continuous improvement activities. As a result, lean production is able to manufacture a larger variety of products, at lower costs and higher quality, with less of every input, compared to traditional mass production: less human effort, less space, less investment, and less development time (Dankbaar, ...