HOW CAN TOYOTA MOTOR CORPORATION ACHIEVE SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT

For a lean enterprise which aims to construct sustainable development, we set a hypothesis that lean could bring the value of sustainability into the organization and try to explore the traveling process of sustainability value. The completion of this process also relies on the Japanese firm’s unique cultural and historical background. Furthermore, lean can contribute to sustainable development at the corporate level through continuous technology and process optimization. But strong sustainability implies that the enterprise needs to do more only than focus on eco-efficiency, and it depends on the senior management understanding of sustainability to some extent. For moral and practical reasons, realizing sustainable development needs collective decision making for the common good (Ball & Miline, 2005). If they determine their attitudes to ecological systems, natural and energy conservation will be a form topic in the company. Ecological values will become an essential criterion in the appraisement of corporate performance as well as traditional economic criteria. It will assist the firm to have a more reasonable production scale, and the usage of renewable and non-renewable resources will be more brilliant in the production. Finally, it will influence the values of the firm. But it may put the firm in an ethical dilemma caused by the conflicts between profits and future generation’s interest.

Features and prospects of implementation of the integrated Lean Six Sigma methodology at the enterprise

The article considers the integrated Lean Six Sigma methodology. The author shows that today enterprises use the Lean Six Sigma methodology to improve production indicators, optimize the product portfolio, achieve strategic goals. The paper clarifies the essence of the American (Six Sigma) and Japanese (Lean) enterprise management methodology. The study highlights some features, system tools and methods of continuous improvement in the framework of the implementation of the integrated Lean Six Sigma methodology at the enterprise. The article highlights a number of key success factors for the implementation of this methodology. The paper proposes the criteria for assessing the readiness of the enterprise to its implementation. The scientific novelty of the study is that the author identified the advantages and problems of implementing the Lean Six Sigma methodology at enterprises. The author made a proposal on the need for mandatory assessment of the company's readiness to work on the Lean Six Sigma methodology using fuzzy logic tools, and also highlighted the stages of its implementation. The practical significance of the work done is that it can serve as a basis for further scientific research in the field of the Lean Six Sigma methodology.

Using Enterprise Architecture to Integrate Lean Manufacturing, Digitalization, and Sustainability: A Lean Enterprise Case Study in the Chemical Industry

The chemical industry has sustained the development of global economies by providing an astonishing variety of products and services, while also consuming massive amounts of raw materials and energy. Chemical firms are currently under tremendous pressure to become lean enterprises capable of executing not only traditional lean manufacturing practices but also emerging competing strategies of digitalization and sustainability. All of these are core competencies required for chemical firms to compete and thrive in future markets. Unfortunately, reports of successful transformation are so rare among chemical firms that acquiring the details of these cases would seem an almost impossible mission. The severe lack of knowledge about these business transformations thus provided a strong motivation for this research. Using The Open Group Architecture Framework, we performed an in-depth study on a real business transformation occurring at a major international chemical corporation, extracting the architecture framework possibly adopted by this firm to become a lean enterprise. This comprehensive case study resulted in two major contributions to the field of sustainable business transformation: (1) a custom lean enterprise architecture framework applicable to common chemical firms making a similar transformation, and (2) a lean enterprise model developed to assist chemical firms in comprehending the intricate and complicated dynamics between lean manufacturing, digitalization, and sustainability.

EXPLORING THE POTENTIAL OF LEAN PHILOSOPHY TO SPREAD THE VALUE OF SUSTAINABILITY IN THE JAPANESE AUTOMOBILE INDUSTRY: THE CASE OF TOYOTA MOTOR CORPORATION

The criticality of sustainability suggests the need to understand how commercial organization could implement sustainable development. This paper focuses on lean manufacturing and intends to explore the potential of lean philosophy to bring the value of sustainability into an organization. The ultimate purpose of the study lies in the comparison between the possibility of lean philosophy to lead to something remotely resembling a contribution to strong sustainability and what lean enterprise present in the sustainability report. According to the lean practices implemented in Toyota Motor Corporation and previous literature about lean philosophy, we explore how lean philosophy could assist spread the value of sustainability initiated by the top management and construct sustainable development in the corporate value chain. The result shows that the corporate philosophy could assist in achieving a consensus among all the stakeholders and mobilizing them moving towards sustainable development. The value of sustainability can also be beneficial from the process of implementing lean practices. However, the report implies that Toyota focuses more on how to utilize lean tools to achieve technological optimization in operation to address sustainability issues, rather than having a thorough understanding of the ecological limits of the planet. This paper offers some helpful reference to lean manufacturing and discuss the potential role of lean philosophy in the construction of sustainable development.

Development of lean enterprise implementation methodology: an ISM approach

PurposeThere is a concern in literature about the critical elements of lean enterprise (LE) that can be represented as pillars of lean enterprise excellence. However, existing frameworks proposed on LE excellence are very few. The purpose of this paper is to develop a relationship model among the pillars of a proposed framework of LE excellence in Indian manufacturing industry by Jasti et al. (2020) with the help of interpretive structural modelling (ISM) and structural equation modelling (SEM).Design/methodology/approachThe ISM is constructed on two exemplary cases of lean operations from two Indian manufacturing organisations. These cases were selected based on the implementation of lean practices in respective organisations. The two manufacturing organisations which implemented lean practices at different levels were selected as contenders for constructing ISM. The relationships among pillars and constructs of LE framework are obtained from ISM, and later subjected to statistical testing for model fit by using SEM. The input to SEM was the respondent's data collected in a previous study.FindingsThe outcome of the present study revealed that the successful implementation of LE framework requires an appropriate strategy along with top management commitment to get a complete benefits of LE. The study has proposed a strategy to implement the proposed LE framework in Indian manufacturing industry. This study has revealed that ISM developed based on the focal company that implemented lean practices effectively is statistically fit for LE framework.Research limitations/implicationsThe study has established paired relationships among lean pillars for an effective implementation of LE framework. The investigation was started by collecting opinions of experts to perform the appropriate interpretations subsequently. However, the expert judgements can be qualitative in nature and prone to bias and impact the final outcome. To overcome these a large-scale empirical survey is suggested to provide a better catch for interactions in LEs.Practical implicationsThis study helps in providing concrete practical implications to both academic researchers as well as industry professionals. The practitioners normally focus on finding readymade strategies for implementing LE in the organizations. The comprehensiveness of the present work helps the practitioners in implementing LE strategy with ease. The study revealed that management commitment and leadership is driving force but needs strategic implementation methodology for successful implementation.Social implicationsManufacturing industries across the world have been struggling to understand and implement LE strategy effectively. Most of the governments across the world are supporting and motivating various industry practitioners to implement LE strategy by providing financial assistance for conducting training programmes. However, many organizations across the world were not able to implement LE strategy successfully. The present study provides a strategy to implement LE framework effectively in an organization.Originality/valueThe study offers a unique approach for analysing the underlying relationships among pillars of LE for effective management. Researchers can use the results of this study for developing frameworks in various domains of LE.

Development of a framework for lean enterprise

Purpose Lean enterprise (LE) is one of the emerging fields because of its impact across industry sectors. There were many LE framework articles published in the past without reviewing or considering the already published literature which lead to lots of inconsistencies in the existing frameworks of LE. This study aims to critically review the existing frameworks to identify inconsistencies and propose a new LE framework to overcome limitations of the existing LE frameworks. Design/methodology/approach A systematic literature review was conducted to identify the existing LE frameworks. All these identified frameworks were classified based on the following criteria: novelty of the framework; based on participation of academicians/practitioners/consultants; whether the proposed frameworks were verified; type of verification methodology used; and the degree of standardization of LE elements. A comprehensive LE framework was proposed after a thorough review of the existing LE frameworks which has been validated through reliability analysis and validity analysis. Findings The analysis revealed major inconsistencies such as lack of adaptation of existing frameworks in literature which lead to incoherent elements in LE frameworks. The study also found shortage of significant participation of academicians and practitioners in LE frameworks development compared to consultants. The present work established a road map to find a “cohesive theory of LE”, which resulted in the development of a set of coherent elements. Finally, a comprehensive LE framework was proposed with the help of extensive literature review. The initially proposed 106 elements were condensed to 50 after the validation to increase the focus and relevance. Research limitations/implications The proposed LE framework needs to be validated via an empirical approach or clinical approach such as a case study which will be the future work. Originality/value The present study performed extensive literature review to identify LE-related articles, corresponding elements and established coherency among them. A new comprehensive framework was proposed.