Lean Project Management: A Study of Application

  Knowledge Shelf  

One needs only to “Google” lean project manage­ment (LPM) to appreciate the call for a new, more streamlined approach to project management. Is the so-called lean approach to project management necessarily different from traditional project management? If the answer is yes, what is LPM, and more importantly, how does it foster more efficient accomplishment of project work? The purpose of this paper is to explore the concept of LPM by examining a Fortune 100 organization’s application of lean to some of its project work.

What is Lean Project Management?

Before we examine the application of LPM it is necessary to describe its framework. Unfortunately, unlike A Guide to the Project Management Body of Knowledge (PMBOK_® Guide), which clearly characterizes traditional project management (Project Management Institute, 2008), LPM is something of an enigma. It is widely agreed, however, that LPM is ground­ed in the Toyota product system (TPS) methodology (Ballard, 2003; Horman & Russel, 1996; Leach, 2005).

The TPS was conceived in the 1970s as a means to improve Toyota’s operational efficiency through the system­atic elimination of waste (Lander & Liker, 2006; Lander & Liker, 2007). While many believe TPS is a set of tools, it is in fact a model of work that involves philosophy, processes, people, and problem solving …

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