Lean Principles for Knowledge Workers - IEDP
"Conventional wisdom is that the thoughtful work of lawyers, consultants, software engineers, creative directors, et al cannot be reduced to best practice formulas, and this has rather closed down the debate. Now some new research has cast fresh light on this subject, suggesting that ‘lean’ production principles long deployed in manufacturing can in fact make a valuable contribution to increasing the efficiency of workers in the ‘knowledge’sector."
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“Attempts to apply lean principles to knowledge work have proved frustratingly difficult” says Professor Upton. “Unlike manufacturing, the work is not repetitive and easily defined and often relies on knowledge locked inside the individual’s head. But our research shows that such work can benefit from lean production principles in a number of ways.
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they were able to sift through the vast array of oft-quoted principles of lean operations, and hone in on those that worked – and delivered genuine performance improvements - using an evidence-based, scientific approach for knowledge-based settings.