Lean Six Sigma

These days, Western companies face tough competition. They have to rely on effective ways of securing their competitive advantage. Toyota felt the affects of this competitive struggle some time ago but nevertheless succeeded in surpassing established players in the automobile industry by developing and implementing the famous ‘Toyota Production System’, aimed at delivering the best quality at the lowest price in the shortest possible time. Toyota rocketed into the top 3 in the automobile industry and has for years lead the way in price, quality and productivity.

On the basis of a comparative study conducted in the early 1990s, university professors, Womack and Jones realised that the tools and techniques of the Toyota approach were universal and could be applied to increase the competitiveness of other companies. They took it upon themselves to translate the system and called it ‘Lean Thinking’.

Consequently, ‘Lean Thinking’ has experienced a rapid rise as a business strategy with remarkable results in the United States where no less than 55% of production companies use Lean as a guideline for their improvement strategy. Lean also appears to be an important driving force behind the improvement of administrative processes and service provision in terms of customer relations and cost effectiveness.