How Different Is a Lean Enterprise? - Raphael L. Vitalo, Ph.D. and Christopher J. Bujak

Introduction

The full adoption of the lean approach to commerce as described by Vitalo, Bujak, Vitalo, Bierley, and Ruffino (2023) in their book The Lean Champion Resource Guide penetrates every nook and cranny of an enterprise. To appreciate its real-world effects, we need to translate the abstract description of the lean enterprise approach into how it is expressed at the practical level. Only is this way can we reveal just how different a lean enterprise is from the typical commercial organization.

A Comparison of a Typical Business and a Lean Enterprise

Exhibit 1, below, contrasts the typical large U.S. business with described by Vitalo, Bujak, Vitalo, Bierley et al. (2023) vision of a lean enteprise of the same size. By “large,” we mean businesses with revenues of approximately one billion U.S. dollars or more. The picture of the typical large U.S. business was generated by the jsut mentioned authors based on their more than 20 years of working with such companies and from published research studies. Use this comparison to consolidate your understanding of how a business implementing the lean enterprise approach to commerce, as they describe it, operates. Use it also to appreciate in concrete terms how completely different such an enterprise is from the typical U.S. firm. These differences express themselves most clearly in the following feature categories:

• Business intent (purpose, vision, and core values) as practiced, not as expressed in public speech
• Strategy (commercial and organizational strategy)¹
• Structure (how business components are decomposed and organized in relation to each other)
• People (a detail view of the status and relationship of executives, managers, supervisors, and front-line employees to the business based on the business’s organizational strategy)
• Critical systems (Measurement and Feedback System, Performance Management System, Learning System, other Human Resource Enabling Systems, Computer-based Information Systems, Accounting System)
• Work processes
• Workplaces
• Product and service offerings
• Extended value stream

References

Vitalo, R.L., Bujak, C.J., Vitalo, J.P., Bierley, P.V. & Ruffino, B.J. (2023a). The Lean Champion Resource Guide. Austin: TX, Lowrey Press.

Footnotes

¹A commercial strategy describes what a business will offer to whom to generate revenue; where it will enter into commerce; how it will attract, win, and retain customers; and how it will realize profit as defined by the commercial model the enterprise implements. A business’s organizational strategy guides the formation of the business. It identifies what its critical-to-success resources are for long-term success, the essential features each such resource must possess, and how the enterprise should organize itself structurally and socially to succeed.

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©2023 Vital Enterprises - Austin, Texas 78729 - Published April 20, 2023

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