Mark Graban

Lean Should Not Be “L.A.M.E”
July 25, 2007

If you’re a regular reader of the Lean Blog, you’ll recognize some common themes. If you’re about to become a regular reader of this blog, let me introduce some of these themes:

Lean vs L.A.M.E.

“L.A.M.E.” is my invented short hand for “Lean As Misguidedly Executed.” Ok, maybe a somewhat awkward phrase, but I like the acronym. I use LAME as a way of distinguishing failed or botched attempts at implementing Lean that violated a core aspect of the true Lean / Toyota Production System approach.

One example of LAME is when a company “attempts” to implement Lean and then gives up, saying that “Lean failed.” It’s not correct to say that “Lean,” a concept, failed. What you have, more often, is a leadership failure, an inability to make Lean work. 

Let’s say you copy one tool from Toyota that you think is “Lean,” such as a moving assembly line, rather than adopting the Lean mindset and the broader methodology. It’s very tempting for management to then make a quick leap to saying “See, Lean doesn’t work here.” 

Successful Lean implementations require leadership, including being able to have a vision for the future, being able sell this vision (and Lean) to your employees, and being able to follow through and have the discipline required to make Lean more than the program of the month. Lean doesn’t fail companies, leaders do.

One variation of Lean failure (or L.A.M.E.) is taking a single Lean tool, such as 5S, and implementing with full zeal. We might fully implement 5S while ignoring grave customer concerns (such as late shipments and slow time to market). This Lean tool might be the equivalent of re-arranging the deck chairs on the Titanic (or at least putting tape around them). 

We might even miss the full impact and intent of the 5S process – a process that should make the workplace easier for employees while reducing waste and making problems more apparent. If we think 5S means just putting tape around everything (without thinking through where those items should be), will that help much?

5S is much more than putting tape around things (and there are some things you should NOT put tape around, we’ll cover that in a future post). Lean is much more than 5S. Lean is much more than all of the Lean tools put together. Lean is a management system. One Toyota diagram shows a triangle with three pillars of TPS – technical, managerial, and philosophical – with people development being right in the middle. All of this, the Lean culture, Lean management, and Lean philosophy, combined with “respect for people” adds up to the Toyota Way and a Lean culture.

I often go into a new client site where Lean has a negative reputation. Not because of anything we have said or done, but because of instances of L.A.M.E. the employees have heard about, often in their own communities. People often associate Lean with layoffs or working people too hard because that’s what L.A.M.E. companies often do. People read about it in the press, “Lean” is blamed for rumored massive firings and offshoring at IBM Global Services. As I pointed out on the Lean Blog, this isn’t Lean, it’s L.A.M.E. When people hear about a hospital that implemented “Lean” and had a rash of injuries, that’s not Lean (which places a premium on safety and quality), that’s L.A.M.E.

Managers often do “mean” things to employees, they do this under any heading and under any management system. Mean rhymes with Lean, so the phrase “Lean and Mean” rolls right off of people’s tongues. Lean, properly executed, is the furthest thing from lean – it’s good for the customers, good for the employees, and good for the long-term health of the organization.  

We say Lean is not mean, but the flip side of that does mean that Lean is always “nice.” “Respect for People” means something different than being nice to each other all of the time, a topic we’ll cover in a future blog post.

For more posts about L.A.M.E. from the Lean Blog

Posted by Mark Graban on July 25, 2007 | Comments (0)