Lean Outsourcing

By Mike Lopez

A Bay Area-based global outsourcing expert, Mark Zetter, and HP’s former worldwide manufacturing education manager, Eric Olsen, Ph.D., have written a white paper on Lean Outsourcing. In the article, they raise a very good point. United States-based lean consultants often try to sell lean as a way to curtail the flow of manufacturing jobs offshore. As more offshore companies embrace the principles of lean, matching the quality and customer focus of their United State-based counterparts, the truly lean company may find that the most lean solution is to outsource. In graduate school, I personally experienced the benefits of Lean Outsourcing. I employed multiple computer programmers to do work for me overseas through the www.rentacoder.com website. The arrangement allowed me to offer the services of a large website programming business with no fixed overhead. All my costs were variable and everything was ordered just-in-time. Another review of the article can be found at Evolving Excellence.

About LeanBlog.org: Mark Graban is a consultant, author, and speaker in the “lean healthcare” methodology, focused on improving quality and patient safety, improving access, reducing costs, and fully engaging healthcare professionals. He is also the Chief Improvement Officer for KaiNexus.