This paper by John Seddon, Brendan O’Donovan and Keivan Zokaei (originally developed for a Warwick University course) explores the development of ‘factory thinking’ in the service management literature, with its emphasis on standardisation and off-shoring in order to achieve economies of scale and reduce unit costs. It argues that the development of the ‘lean’ movement continued this focus on managing cost and activity. As a result, ‘lean’ became synonymous with ‘process efficiency’ and the opportunity for significant performance improvement as exemplified by Toyota was lost. By revisiting the ideas behind Ohno’s Toyota Production System, a systems service management archetype is instead proposed as an alternative.
The paper is also available in podcast format from ITunes – either click the link from The Systems Thinking Review website, or go through ITunes and search for the systems thinking review.
Alternatively paste (or click if it lets you) this into your web browser
http://itunes.apple.com/WebObjects/MZStore.woa/wa/viewPodcast?id=303871286&uo=6