L e a n B r i e f i n g
The Newsletter of Lean Manufacturing Strategy
25
April 2007
www.strategosinc.com
The Human Side of Lean
Manufacturing
Hope, Fear, Intention and behavior in
Factory Design
In the 25 years since Lean Manufacturing was introduced to the
U.S., progress has been painfully slow. This
tardiness usually results from neglect of the Human Side, i.e.
those elements of lean and corporate culture that impact people's
attitudes, interactions with others and interaction with technology.
Neglect of the human side is evident in the popularity of Value Stream Mapping. VSM is a great tool for
analyzing and envisioning the technical process, but there is no place on the map for people.
Ideas and concepts about the human side are not new. They date
from, at least, Lillian Gilbreth in the 1920's. However, the many failures
and half-baked implementations of Lean are bringing it new attention. Our
web page, The
Human Side of Lean, explores some of the issues. This involves much more than being
nice and training a lot.
Eric Trist's concept of the
Socio Technical
System (STS) provides a framework for thinking about and
learning about these vague, indeterminate and conditional phenomena. STS
views the workplace as an interrelated system of
people (socio) and machines (technical) that require joint
design and implementation for success.
There are many examples on our website. Our DVD video,
The Human Side of
Lean Manufacturing, has other dramatic examples expressed by workers
with direct experience.
I hope this is all helpful and we wish you great success.
Best Regards,
Quarterman Lee
qlee@strategosinc.com
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(c) 2007 Strategos, Inc.
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