Is Lean No Longer Mean ? - A Study of the Consequences for Working Conditions in Companies Implementing Lean

Lean is today becoming increasingly popular in Swedish manufacturing industry, and the concept has also started to spread to other sectors, such as administration, healthcare and the municipal sector. However, previous studies have suggested that Lean can become “mean”, creating working conditions that are bad for the employees. Conversely, other studies instead suggest that this has less to do with Lean, than with the implementation of Lean. Thus, this paper aims at studying the implementation of Lean in eight medium sized companies over a two year period, using qualitative and quantitative data. First, the results from the qualitative data suggest that these companies implementation of Lean is characterized by Lean coordinators, pilot projects and improvements groups, while the Lean tools mostly used are 5S, SMED, standardization and means to improve the production flow. Second, the perceived effects on working conditions, based on the quantitative data, suggest an improvement in the working environment, an increase in the work with safety and some degree of increase in stress for the workers. Consequently, the implementation structure of these companies does not indicate a “mean” production system, although the long term effects on working conditions cannot be determined, based on these data. Is Lean No Longer Mean? Mikael Brännmark 2(13) Introduction Lean Production is a Toyota-inspired management concept, first introduced by Krafcik (1988) in his article The Success of the Lean Production System, and later developed and made famous by Womack et al. (1991), in the by now classical book The Machine that Changed the World. The concept has recently, during the last decade, become very popular in Swedish society, and has also given rise to concepts such as “Lean Administration”, “Lean Healthcare”, “Lean Product Development”, “Lean Construction”, etc. Also, the presence of famous Swedish companies, such as Scania, Astra Zeneca and Electrolux, who attributes at least part of their successes to their work with Lean, together with a growing Lean consulting industry, does its share in aiding to the popularity of the concept in Sweden. Lean Mean Production Lean has, however, not always had the positive associations that it is often given today in popular media, although there are still critics of Lean. It was not that long ago that you in Sweden spoke of so-called “Lean Mean Production”, or “anorectic production”. The argument was that Lean causes “mean”, or “anorectic”, production systems, which are bad for the employees’ health and working conditions. For instance, several previous studies reports problems created by increased job intensity and higher demands, ergonomics problems (such as musculoskeletal disorders) without increases in the positive aspects of work, such as a broadened set of work duties, work rotation, increase in team work, etc., when Lean has been implemented (Berggren, 1994; Björkman, 1996; Haynes, 1999; Landsbergis et al. 1999). As Berggren put it (1993), Lean is often, by the advocators of the concepts, described as meaning working smarter, not harder – but usually, according to Berggren, it means both. Of course, this does not stand unchallenged; for instance, some researchers has argued that Lean creates less interesting and monotonous work, although the chance of influencing the working situation does exists in a Lean production system (Schouteten & Benders, 2004) and one study performed by Womack et al. (2009) indicates that Lean working systems does not create worse working conditions than non-Lean automotive assembly plants. Other researchers, such as Womack and Jones (2003), Womack et al. (1991) and Liker (2004), has instead argued that a “true” Lean production system will in fact create better working conditions, than non-Lean system, through increases in team work, job rotation, participation in work with continuous improvement activities, increased skill level and broadened work responsibilities for the workers, etc. However, empirical research supporting the argument that so-called “true” Lean systems creates positive working conditions appears to be scarce (Genaidy & Karwowski, 2003). The Implementation of Lean One interpretation of the studies reporting negative consequences of Lean is that the “meanness” is not actually associated with Lean per se, but rather, that they are the consequences of a wrongful implementation of Lean (Björkman, 1996; Womack et. al, 2009). This has also been suggested by Swedish researchers, such as Berglund (2006), although he at the same time speculates that there is an inherent risk for bad working conditions when companies implement Lean, if it is done in an incomplete way, our without sufficient management support and Is Lean No Longer Mean? Mikael Brännmark 3(13) commitment. Another aspect of this, suggested by some Swedish researchers, is the notion that if you do not implement “the whole” Lean concept, but instead, only pick “peaces” of Lean (such as specific Lean techniques), the risk of unwanted consequences of a Lean implementation increases. This is referred to as the “Frankenstein trap”, by some researchers (Blücher et al., 2004). However, there is little empirical evidence supporting this argument, i.e. that an “incomplete” Lean system will be “Frankensteinian”. Nevertheless, the importance of the implementation structure is vital here, since one needs to differentiate between which working conditions effects that the implementation of Lean has, and which effects arise from the future development after Lean has been implemented (i.e. the long term effects of a Lean production system). One such example of the importance of studying the implementation phase is Adler and Cole’s (1993) study of NUMMI, which suggest that the Lean production system in that factory created a “satisfying” work system for the employees, through a high level of worker participation in the implementation. However, other researchers have argued that NUMMI has had many ergonomically related problems during launches of new car models (Adler et al., 1997) and Landsbergis et al. (1999) have also argued that the high level of worker participation, during the implementation reported by Adler and Cole, were in fact not upheld after the implementation phase was over. Another example of the importance of understanding the implementation of Lean, but also of the context in which Lean is implemented, is Seppälä and Klemola’s (2004) study of Finnish companies, working to implement Lean. Their study suggests that Lean in these companies takes on almost socio-technical forms, which could be interpreted to support Hampson’s (1999) argument that social factors, such as the strength of the union, together with the unions power to actually implement their demands, determine if Lean becomes mean. Purpose of this Paper The discussion above suggests that the implementation structure, when Lean is introduced into an organization, is highly important in order to determine if Lean becomes “mean”, although the implementation in itself does not appear to be the whole explanation for when Lean becomes “mean” or not – other factors is at play, as well. Nevertheless, in this paper, the focus will be on studying the implementation phase. Thus, put another way, the purpose of this paper is to study the implementation of Lean in eight medium sized Swedish manufacturing companies, together with the perceived changes on working conditions, over a two year period in order to see if these companies approach to Lean becomes “mean”.