The Elusive Lean Enterprise

Book excerpt: In today's fast-paced and volatile business environment, where customers are demanding increased flexibility and lower cost, companies must operate in a waste-free environment to maintain a competitive edge and grow margins. Lean Enterprise is the process that companies are now adopting to provide superior customer service and improve bottom line performance. Are you contemplating Lean Enterprise for your manufacturing or office facility? Are you already implementing Lean, but dissatisfied with the speed of change? Do your employees think that Lean is just the new flavor of the month? Are you being forced to go Lean by your customers, or your competitors? Are you anticipating going offshore to cut costs? Irrespective of your situation, this book is for you. The Elusive Lean Enterprise is designed to help guide you through the Lean transformation and avoid the pitfalls. Find out why many companies are failing to live up to the promise of Lean, and why there are alternatives to outsourcing or going offshore. In The Elusive Lean Enterprise, lean experts Keith Gilpatrick and Brian Furlong show you what to do, what you must not do, and how to make Lean the way business is done in the 21st century. Learn from the mistakes of others and avoid the trial and error implementation process that often kills the initiative. Find out why you must change, how to change, and how to institutionalize the process. Understand the costs of outsourcing or going offshore and compare these to the Lean alternative. For companies that invest the time and have an effective strategy, Lean Enterprise can produce outstanding results. For those companies that fail to commit to the process and truly change the culture, a Lean Enterprise will truly remain elusive.