Lean services

Lean services is the application of the lean manufacturing concept to service operations. It is distinct in that Lean services are not concerned with the making of ‘hard’ products.

To date, Lean principles of Continuous Improvement and Respect for People have been applied to all manner of services including call center services, health care, higher education, software development, and public and professional services. Conceptually, these implementations follow very similar routes to those in manufacturing settings, and often use some of the same tools and techniques. There are, however, many significant distinctions and the same tools can be applied in different ways. A number of significant service sector organisations have come together to form The Lean Service Forum. to share knowledge, learn from each other and understand different lean journeys.

'Service’ in this context is not limited to ‘the office’ or ‘administration’ that have been the focus of several publications, but also wider service situations that are not necessarily repetitive, where ‘task’ time is not applicable, and where task times may be both long and variable. Service in this context could mean anything from a hospital to a university, from an office process to a consultancy, and from a warehouse to field service maintenance.

It is important not to confuse 'service operations' with the economic definition of service sectors (as distinct from manufacturing sectors), since many ‘service sector’ organizations have manufacturing-like operations in that they produce regular outputs along value streams. It is therefore important to realise that within a service environment you can encounter a range of situations from very repetitive work to that which involves a high degree of discretion on the part of the workforce. Each of these situations require significantly different interpretations of lean, as well as appropriate variations in management approach; this concept is explored further in The Lean Continuum.

‘service’ refers to the ‘service concept’ or ‘product service bundle’, which are all the activities that provide value to the customer along a value stream.

Lean Service has its origin in the Toyota Production System (see Lean manufacturing). Lean in the Service sector is subject itself to continuous improvement, and as such there are an increasing number of concepts that may or may not be included as part of Lean Service.

The original seven wastes (muda) were defined by Taiichi Ohno, the father of the Toyota Production System. These wastes have been often redefined to better fit new organisations, industries, or external pressures.

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Wikipedia