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Make culture become an asset in your Lean journey
Lean management is also a matter of culture. A managerial system requires behaviors that support and sustain the system. The deployment of Lean is dependent on individuals: of those who design it, of those who deploy it, and finally of those who make it live. Human beings do not understand things in the same way because they have their own biases that influence their ways of perceiving and acting. The cultural concept of Lean materializes these frames of references under the concept of multilayered prisms.
Lean practitioners will learn a philosophy and practices developed in Japan within a particular company, such as Toyota, through their own lenses.
The Lean cultural concept emphasizes the importance of managing realities as a whole. On the one hand, some behaviors depend on cultural orientations, which are acquired during the socialization phases of our lives. On the other hand, practices are coming from professional-related rules, habits acquired later and more consciously, which are therefore much more adaptable.
It also highlights the predominant role of managerial systems, whose power of influence on collective behaviors far outweighs that of individuals amongst them. The leaders who drive these systems have therefore a great responsibility. They must ensure the consistency and alignment.
10 Dimensions
Lean management calls for practices and behaviors that are perceived differently in different cultures. But how to manage the cultural change?
Cultural dimensions are available keys to support your cultural transition. They are mostly psychological dimensions or value constructs that provide deep insight into one’s cultural preferences in terms of behaviors and communication. They highlight levers on which lean managers can build on the system and anticipate potential cultural pitfalls. The lean cultural concept is also built on 10 cultural dimensions that have influenced Lean most significantly.
The Lean Cultural Compass (LC²) is a unique intercultural tool dedicated to Lean. It displays national cultures positioning in perspective to Lean culture. This also highlights Toyota Production System designers’ frame of reference.
Beyond LC² that combines interculturality and Lean, the question map for Lean practice within a multicultural context offers a first inclusion of cultural orientations for Lean practitioners.
10 questions to practice Lean within a multicultural context
What prevails?
3 Behaviors
Behaviors supporting Lean philosophy can be divided into 3 main categories: planning, acting, and relating.
The way one behaves, one’s relation to time and approach to others, and the environment significantly influences Lean’s understanding and deployment, a methodology shaped within the Japanese culture at Toyota.
To understand the nature of these biases, and how they influence behaviors, the Lean cultural concept highlights three prism levels:
3 Principles
Ultimately, individuals evolve within cultures and environments that influence one another. Leading a Lean transformation sometimes requires actions at various levels: particular (individuals), cultural, and systemic (organizational level). Only a closer look at the global picture enables us to understand the contrasts that can coexist between individual expression and cultural (collective) values.
A company is a human community, a living organism. It is not a technical system where you can simply press a button to get a result. Lean requires a real managerial impulse, and any organization must set shared standards and ensure that they align with its values.
The 3 essential principles Lean organizations must be based on are: equity, interdependency and sustainability. These shared beliefs are the founding rules and norms of the organizational system. These principles are in fact universal and consistent, beyond cultures. They address the essential psychosocial needs of employees.
Ensuring sustainability, equality and a spirit of interdependence is a real challenge. Sometimes requiring to go back to basics: the company is an economic and social unit, a human community whose members share universal needs. Beyond its technical aspects, the TPS is a philosophy whose principles govern the managerial ecosystem in the service of a sustainable vision.
