Lean Management – reviewing of alternatives
 Download FREE Lean Management Guide Download now! |
Though lean management faces competitions from its siblings, it is yet termed as the best rated policy due to its unique advantages. It solely allows the company to work in tandem with the market demand thereby realizing the requirements sought by consumers. Though Six Sigma also walks in this route to eradicate woes, lean management still remains one step ahead in sensing the customers’ needs.
Even though lean management is a powerful process management tool, other tools are also used by several organizations as separate lean manufacturing techniques or combined with lean management to achieve even greater results. The main alternatives to lean management are Six Sigma, Fordism, Scientific Management or Taylorism, and Theory of Constraints.
Six Sigma is essentially a theory of variation, which is the difference between the input and output processes. Six Sigma uses the techniques of statistics, business, and engineering for various applications such as production, marketing, sales, services, etc.
Fordism is based on the principles advocated by Henry Ford. He stated that methods that reduce the cost of the products should be found to make them cheaper and affordable to ordinary people. He was the first entrepreneur to implement the concept of mass production for taking advantages from economies of scale. He insisted on standardizing of manufacturing process even with laborers of lesser skills. Another contribution of Ford was the moving assembly lines to achieve this manufacturing process standardization.
Taylorism or scientific management was developed by Frederick Taylor. He focused on cost reduction and exact work procedures based on working and movements of individual workers. His major thrust was shifting the focus of lean management from employees to the management personnel. He further emphasized in standardizing the production method of each job and selecting employees with skills suited to that particular production method.
Theory of constraints was introduced by Goldart. His conclusion was that businesses that failed to do well were suffering from inherent constraints. He pointed out that businesses could easily grow if these constrains were identified and eliminated. His main contribution was the buffers concept. He felt that each system should have its own buffer, which would protect the production from discontinuation even when system brakes occurred.
Due to the requirement of trained managers and specialized training to other employees for implementing these alternatives to lean management and the comprehensive focus of Kaizen principles, compared to segmented approaches by other systems, lean management is still the preferred process management technique, though many organizations combine these alternatives with lean management.
