Lean Thinking and Knowledge Work

Posted April 24, 2013 | |

This Cutter IT Journal article defines lean in terms of both customer and business value. It explores the downsides of popular mass-production IT approaches such as outsourcing, enterprise systems (e.g., SAP), and traditional information system design and then discuss helpful Lean alternatives. It also considers a number of IT dichotomies that we can leverage through Lean tools; for instance, creative versus routine, repetitive work.

About The Author
Daniel Jones
Daniel T. Jones is coauthor (with Jim Womack) of the books that exposed the performance leap made by Toyota (The Machine that Changed the World), defined how to follow their example (Lean Thinking), and demonstrated new ways of defining customer value (Lean Solutions). He is a missionary, coach, and speaker, and he and Dr. Womack are the Founding Chairmen of the Lean Global Network of 17 nonprofit institutes around the world, including the Lean… Read More
Steve Bell
Steve Bell serves on the faculty of the Lean Enterprise Institute, and the Lean Global Network. He has published three books: Run Grow Transform, Lean IT and Lean Enterprise Systems. He is a recipient of the Shingo Prize for Operational Excellence, and coined the term “Lean IT.” Mr. Bell has championed the convergence and collaboration across technology communities (including DevOps, Agile, Scrum, ITIL, ITSM, COBIT, ISO, and others) through… Read More
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