Bruce Sheppy

Illusion or delusion--Lean management in the health sector.

PURPOSE There has been considerable interest in the implementation of practices imported from manufacturing into healthcare as a solution to rising healthcare spending and disappointing patient safety indicators. One approach that has attracted particular interest is Lean management and the purpose of this paper is to engage with this topic. DESIGN/METHODOLOGY/APPROACH Secondary research. FINDINGS Despite widespread enthusiasm about the potential of Lean management processes, evidence about its contribution to higher organisational performance remains inconsistent. RESEARCH LIMITATIONS/IMPLICATIONS This paper engages with the major Lean concepts of operations management and human resource management, including just-in-time, total quality management, total productive maintenance and does not engage in-depth with concepts related to employee empowerment, and training PRACTICAL IMPLICATIONS This paper contributes to the organisational management literature in healthcare by showing that although Lean management seems to have the potential to improve organisational performance it is far from a panacea against under performing hospitals. SOCIAL IMPLICATIONS It informs policy making by suggesting that a progressive managerial philosophy has a stronger impact on healthcare performance than the adoption of practices from any particular managerial approach. ORIGINALITY/VALUE This paper provides a critical evaluation of the impact of Lean practices in informing healthcare policy. The paper contributes to the organisational management literature in healthcare by showing that even though Lean management in healthcare appears to have the potential to improve organisational performance; there remain problems with its application.

Hope and glory: an expanded social strategy diagnosis model to incorporate corporate social responsibility within business strategy

Corporate social responsibility has been seen by corporations as a practice to adopt as an act of philanthropy. There have been attempts to expand the role of social responsibility to business problems however there has never been an attempt to consider the strategic alignment of social outcomes to strategy. This article analyses the role of strategy by providing a review of strategy using Whittingtons generic strategies model and expanding the same model to incorporate a social strategy model that supports the anecdotal idea that social responsibility can be potentially strategic. The paper centres its argument within the Indian context.