Dr. Monica Tracey of Oakland University's Pawley Institute and I have published another article on our original research on lean and HR. This one is published in World of Work Journal and a link can be found here for a PDF download.
We are working on a 2nd round of research now and appreciate your help by completing this quick survey. We need as many people to participate as possible.
Fundamentally, our premise is this: HR CAN and SHOULD be a significant influence on the culture, behaviors and development of an organization. If lean is about these things, then HR should have more than just a passive role in the lean transformation. However, that's exactly what we see. HR should be a driving force for change, and we intend to layout a roadmap for making this happen.
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Jamie Flinchbaugh
Jamie Flinchbaugh is an accomplished Entrepreneur, Senior Executive, and Board Member with more than 20 years of success spanning finance, manufacturing, automotive, and management consulting. Leveraging extensive operational experience, Jamie is an invaluable asset for a company seeking expert guidance with process improvements, lean strategies, and leadership coaching in order to transform operations, reduce costs, and drive profitability. His areas of expertise include continuous improvement, entrepreneurship, coaching and training, process transformation, business strategy, and organizational design.
Larry Bossidy made the same point in his book “Execution”, which doesn’t say anything about Lean, but emphasizes the “people” component of the People/Operations/Strategy triangle in management.
Organizations which implement lean successfully do so because they focus on making the People think about Lean, rather than enforcing Lean directly. Thats what its really all about. Encouraging and education the people to be lean, and not about making the factory lean.
Exactly. So often, HR is about transactions – hiring, firing, payroll. But it isn’t really about strategically getting the right people in the right spot and developing people in the right way. In my mind, that role is more important than the CFO.