Editorial note for the special issue on “Lean Six Sigma for higher education”
Article Type: Guest editorial From: International Journal of Quality & Reliability Management, Volume 32, Issue 9.
Businesses today are always on the lookout for ways to improve their bottom-line by systematically eliminating waste from business processes as well as reducing unnecessary or undesirable variation in business processes which result in defects,errors or even failures leading to customer dissatisfaction. There is a clear misconception across many public sector organisations that Lean Six Sigma (LSS) is suited solely to manufacturing companies, however the situation within the higher education (HE)sector is very similar to that of firms within the manufacturing and service industry – facing fierce competition, limited budget availability, government funding slashed and students adopting a consumer approach to their learning.
Although LSS has been widely used in industry for over a decade, but its application in the context of HEI's is still in the embryonic stages. The papers in this special issue have been selected from the first international conference on LSS for HE founded and chaired by the Guest Editor of this special issue. The principal aim of the conference has been to provide a unique international forum where participants freely exchange challenges and experiences on the application of Lean, Six Sigma and LSS methodologies in the HE context.
The challenges facing LSS implementation in HE have similarities with many other sectors which have embarked on the LSS journey. Traditional management practices of HEIs are focused on the individual while LSS emphasises continuous improvement through a team working and project-based approach. There are several other attributes which are involved in the value chain in the HE like interest of the candidate, subject, course material, tutor or instructor, tutor's personality traits, tutor's skill set, prerequisites of the course, examination pattern, etc. Quantifying these attributes for data collection becomes a major challenge, as these are more qualitative variables.
Michelle Brodke from Bowling Green State University, USA, provide evidence from her experience on organisational change and transformation to implement and sustain Lean in HE. She also provides some practical and useful guidelines for implementing institution-wide Lean initiatives in HE.
Theresa Waterbury from the Winona State University, USA, elucidates an excellent case study on Lean in HE showing the challenges encountered, success factors required for the implementation as well as a good commentary on the key lessons learned from the introduction of Lean to a HE institute. She argues that the current roadmaps on Lean are more suited to other industrial sectors and therefore it is highly desirable to develop a bespoke Lean roadmap for HE sector.
Svensson et al. presents the LSS journey of a new established University (King Abdullah University of Science and Technology (KAUST)) in Saudi Arabia. The paper illustrates the various aspects of LSS including the infrastructure required for the initiative, project selection process, some of the tools used within the projects and the next steps ahead of the journey. There are a very few universities in the world which have integrated Lean and Six Sigma methodologies in the HE setting and KAUST in Saudi Arabia is certainly one of them.
Douglas et al. provides an excellent commentary on the different forms of waste in Lean thinking applied to HE context, followed by some recommendations to reduce such forms of waste. The authors of the article argue that previous studies have focused on individual processes such as curriculum design or student assessment. However this paper takes a holistic view demonstrating how Lean thinking theories can be practically applied across both academic and administrative areas of HEI operations.
Thomas and Antony present some differences that exist between educational institutions (HE and further education) in the methods and practices employed in the development and implementation of Lean projects. The authors found that although further education institutions (FEIs) had much more experience in the development of Lean initiatives, the organisational infrastructure and dynamics towards driving lean in FEIs was less well embedded into the culture. On the other hand, although HEIs were generally slower in getting off the mark, there seemed to be more willingness to adopt Lean initiatives and we will be witnessing further growth of Lean and Six Sigma applications in this sector in the forthcoming years.
Professor Jiju Antony - School of Management and Languages, Heriot-Watt University, Edinburgh, UK
