ABSTRACT
Lean as we know it is usually considered a factory methodology, largely an adaptation of the Toyota production system, developed and improved throughout the second half the 20th century. Much scholarly work has been dedicated to show that many of these principles actually originated with either Henry Ford in the United States in the early 1920s or with the concept of takt time in Germany in the prewar buildup of the 1930s. However, from a practical perspective when people hear Lean, they think of a Japanese factory and its imitators. The frequent use of terms like kaizen and poka yoke does nothing to dispel that idea. The success and rapid adoption of Lean methodologies for factories and supply chains worldwide have been well documented. In much of the Western world, including the United States, legions of consultants and business authors have labored to bring these factory-spawned ideas into the office workplace.
