PART 3

In Pursuit of Sustainable Excellence

WHAT BUSINESSES AND INSTITUTIONS need today is a repeatable structure for advancing in their lean dynamics journey, from initial concept to its highest level of maturity. They need a methodology that will guide them to reach beyond the temporary gains that so often mark the beginning of the journey—through the challenges that can thwart progress at each level along the way.

Chapter 7 suggests a structure that can be applied at any level of progress and reapplied once new progress is made. Chapter 8 describes how innovation must be advanced not as a separate entity, as is so often done, but integrated as part of an overarching lean dynamics transformation. Chapter 9 takes this idea a step further, describing the importance of reaching out with new products and services that meet the actual, the anticipated, and even the unrecognized demands of the marketplace, allowing organizations to respond quickly, beyond what the competition can deliver. It describes how those that advance to the highest levels of lean maturity establish a strong connection between what it is that their customers seek and their own ability to deliver it across its broad continuum of circumstances. In doing so, they become increasingly able to create new opportunities, a key to sustaining and advancing value even in challenging circumstances.

Shifting from traditional ways of thinking is central to advancing in lean maturity, which is a theme explored in Chapter 10. It describes how setting a course toward a sustainable lean capability from the outset is critical to creating and sustaining this focus and keeping efforts from plateauing at lower maturity levels and to advancing through the challenges to the tremendous possibilities that can result.