
LEI announces new partnership
NEWS - LEI partners with the Institute for Intrapreneurship to help established and startup companies to become more innovative using lean thinking and practices.
The Lean Enterprise Institute announced a partnership with The Institute for Intrapreneurship (IFI), a Utah-based innovation collaborative, to help established and startup enterprises operationalize and monetize innovation and build a generation of intrapreneurs.
John Shook, CEO of LEI, said: “This partnership will support our mutual clients in their pursuit of finding new revenue and job growth from product, process and management system innovation and continuous improvement within their businesses.”
Randy M. Favero, co-founder of IFI, also commented: “The economy has changed over the past 10 years in a manner that requires a new view of corporate leadership and the way innovation is managed. Innovation has long been recognized as the path to growth and it is time to help business move from theory to practice and implement the cultural elements of intrapreneurship.
“Companies that develop a culture of intrapreneurship augmented with lean thinking and practice soon find themselves answering the demanding question of ‘what’s next.’”
The Institute for Intrapreneurship brings together business enterprises, thought leaders and researchers from academia, and stimulus programs from government to advance the interest in and ability to drive value from innovation.
Working together, IFI and Lean Enterprise Institute will pioneer new approaches to accelerating growth founded on proven practices and the application of new ideas. Shook continued, “The time is right to infuse the proven practices of lean with the principles of intrapreneurship to accelerate growth-centered innovation that executives seek and both businesses and the economy need.”
Future plans for the partnership include the first ever Conference on Intrapreneurship and Lean Transformation in the first quarter of 2015.{jcomments off}
Read more

CASE STUDY – Facing costly inventory errors, Hidrogística transformed its warehouse operations by engaging its team, standardizing processes, and building a culture of ownership – reducing discrepancies from 5% to near zero.


FEATURE - In this article, taken from LEI's Design Brief, Jim Morgan talks about the often-overlooked topic of building quality into new products. Learn how a customer-centric approach in development can prevent costly rework and build lasting trust.


FEATURE – Faced with long lead-times to hire new people and with tens of millions paid in sick leave every year, the HR department of Dutch railway operator NS has turned to lean thinking to set them on the right track for the future.


FEATURE - In this essay, first appeared in his book Gemba Walks, Jim P. Womack describes the benefits of launching lean in a greenfield environment drawing from his experience volunteering in Central America.