Have you completed your lean implementation? If so, then congratulations are in order, but most experts say you can’t be too lean. So goes the lean journey: you can get close, but the end is ever on the horizon and always out of reach.

When we launched Advanced Manufacturing magazine in 1999, we were among the first industrial magazines to write extensively about lean manufacturing. At that time, lean was making a revival and was being dusted off and revisited as a good business strategy for manufacturers, particularly those adjusting to the just-in-time demands of their customers.

Now many experts view lean manufacturing, and its associated waste reduction strategies, as essential survival tools for the rough and tumble post-recession global manufacturing arena. So what happened? Well, simply adopting lean manufacturing is ceasing to be a competitive advantage and not going lean is also an almost certain ticket to manufacturing oblivion (unless of course your product is so unique and in demand that you have no competitors).

But for all the lean efforts in North America, manufacturers here need to consider that manufacturers in other lower cost manufacturing regions are also showing an increased interest in lean manufacturing.

To read the rest of this editorial, click on the link below:

http://www.advancedmanufacturing.com/Sept04/editorsnote.htm