Different perceptions of Lean in Office Design
Christina Bodin Danielsson, Stress Research Institute, Stockholm University/
Brunnberg and Forshed Architects Ltd., Stockholm
Stress Research Institute, Stockholm University, SE-106 91 Stockholm
E-mail: christina.bodin.danielsson@stressforskning.su.se
Abstract
This article investigates what lean means in an office context. Two main perspectives have
been identified: 1) one scientific management approach that advocates a "standardization" of
the office design, and 2) one that promotes teamwork by office design to support problem
solving and learning organization in lean in order to shorten lead times and free up time. The
two different approaches are exemplified with their different features and implication to office
work. A concluding problematization of the concept of lean office design is done in the
summary.
Keywords: Lean, Office Design, Tayloristic, standardization, team, learning organization
Introduction
Lean is one of the strongest trends in contemporary work organization within governmental
and municipal operations in Sweden. The trend seems to be the same in other Scandinavian
countries as well. It was e.g. in Denmark found that in year 2007 was 70% of the
municipalities, 50% of government operations and 40% of the private sector involved in a
lean project in various ways (Edwards, Bojesen, & Paarup Nielsen, 2010). With the
introduction of lean in the civil service it has only been a matter of time before lean would be
applied to office design. The question is then what does lean mean in an office context and
what implication does it have. The question is important to investigate since the the office is
the physical work for a majority of the workforce in the western world and this number is
constantly increasing due to the transition from a production to a service society in the
Western world (Brill, Weidemann, Alard, Olson, & Keable, 2001; Duffy, 1999). In addition
to this, we know that the office environment plays a great impact in the daily life of these
people since a full-time employee spends approx. 40% of the waking hours at work.
The overall goal of lean is to free up time and work more efficiently by creating a better
workflow, visualize the orderliness, short lead times, reduce waste, implementing continuous
improvements and increase flexibility. The concept of lean has evolved over time and due to
this has the concept has been interpreted differently by different actors, which has left room
for a variety of different implementations despite a clear goal (P. Hines, M. Holweg, & N.
Rich, 2004). As we look closer at the matter, the same shifting idea of what lean means exist
in the area of office design as well. Despite this can two main perspectives be identified: 1)
the neo-Tayloristic lean office, that applies a scientific management approach that advocates a
"standardization" of the office design, and 2) the team-based lean office, that focuses on
problem solving and learning organization in lean in order to shorten lead times and free up
time.
Flex-office, is an office type that is often referred to as a lean office, together with its less
well-defined sub-groups that are called "hot desking" and "hoteling." Flex-office is an office
type defined by the fact that the employees’ hold no personal workstation, but also by other
features such as good access to back-up rooms, i.e. rooms for concentrated work, meetings
etc. and the ability work outside the office on an as need-basis. Another important feature is
that the office is dimensioned for <70% of the total work force since people are expected to be
absent from workstations due to in meetings, work outside the office, illness etc (for details
see Bodin Danielsson, 2007, 2010). Hot desking is defined as an office in which employees
taken on a first-come-first-served basis and hoteling is an office defined by non-personal
workstations that are booked in advance (Millward, Haslam, & Postmes, 2007; Stegmeier,
2008). All three types of offices apply a "clean desk policy" (Fredrickson, 1989), which
implies that the workstation must be cleaned from personal attributes after use, thus not be
personalized by employees. These features have collectively made to flex-office and its
subgroups colloquially referred to as lean office. There are obvious "lean advantages" to the
characteristics to these offices, such as inability for employees to adjust work stations makes
it easy to move both people and groups within an office (Hobson, 2006; Thompson, 2000).
This also facilitates the work of janitorial and facility management department in charge
rearrangement, because the changing workplace are both less emotional and less linked to the
status (Keyte & Locher, 2004; Titman, 1991). This latter factor facilitates the rotation of both
individual employees and teams in an office. The lack of important lean functions makes it
however not possible classify these three offices as lean without further developments of their
concepts. Although they all three can be useful approaches in lean office design, especially
flex-office due to its clear "activity base" approach (Becker, 2004).
The two identified perspectives on lean office design – the neo-Tayloristic lean office and
team-based lean office – differentiate from each other, but despite this fact they share some
characteristics due to the common goal of making the work process more efficient by
eliminating factors that does not create value for the end costumer. Both perspectives are
based on the concept of "cooperating production" (Shah & Ward, 2003), which is a
prerequisite for a successful implementing of lean. This requires that all levels of an
organization work together, from individual and team level to management level.
Cooperating production is characterized by the breaking hierarchies within an organization.
This manifests itself in: a) horizontal control is applied instead of hierarchical control, b)
customized solutions outweigh standardized activities, c) contribution to achieve the
collective goal outweighs loyalty and reliability, d) acceptances for conflicts and discussions
as they viewed as a method of development (Edwards et al., 2010). This cooperating
production takes different forms in the two different perspectives on lean office. It is to a
higher degree implemented in the team-based lean office due to its greater focus on the team
e.g. by the rotating team leader role and less focus on standardization. The less
standardization in team-based lean office, makes it in a sense anti-Tayloristic (Pruijt, 2003).
To conclude, how much of cooperating productions that does exists within the neo-Tayloristic
approach can be debated (see latter discussion).
In addition to cooperating production marked a lean office by the clear focus on the customer
and continuous improvements of the efficiency of the work process in various ways. Different
methods are applied to achieve a more efficient work process in the office. Tapping and
Shuker (2003) means that an extensive review is absolutely necessary in which each step is
studied in detail, from the individual level with each employee, through the team level to
department level. In this review, the team's total time for the work process is examined by
breaking it down from time used per week to daily. Procedures for meeting, lunches, etc. are
studied in order to see where time can be "found," and then examines resources in terms of
the number of available individuals. This method breaks down the time required for the entire
work process into time required per. person in the team, which makes the process easier to
overview. The process is visualized on a bulletin board, in the same way as group members´
different views on how to improve the work process is visualized at meetings to clarify the
work process and thereby easier find possibilities for improvements. This method - visual
planning or kanban- is central in lean office design and includes different methods such as e.g.
scrum. Scrum is a term that originates from Rugby, but has been implemented in lean
management. It refers to the moment when the ball is in play and the rugby team plays
together to bring the ball up the plan by cross-functional teams to reach the goal.
In addition to previous features, the both perspective of Lean Office Design emphasize the
need to visualize the work process for the employees by various means to raise awareness of
it and thereby facilitate improvements. This is how Tapping and Shuker, which align
themselves to the neo-Tayloristic perspective explains it: ̔Applying lean principles in the
office means learning to see the flow of business processes in terms of units of work or
information̕ (Tapping & Shuker, 2003, p. 49). By highlighting the work process physically,
given employees the opportunity to control their own part of the process, therefore must a
a lean office by definition be a "visible office" in their opinion. A visible office is defined by
following characteristics: (1) plenty of meeting places where employees can interact and share
ideas for work improvements, (2) common standards for storage of work material and levels
of current cleaning the office, a so-called 5S program and "clean desk policy", (3) job rotation
– between employees within a team, but sometimes also between different teams or
departments.
The neo-Tayloristic lean office design
The first described perspective on lean office design applies a management approach
influenced by Taylor and scientific management (Taylor, 1985), which advocates a
"standardized" and minimalistic office design in which the individual is not to leave any
personal footprint. This perspective is called neo-Tayloristic lean office (Pruijt, 2003) and this
is often what people refers to as a lean office (Knight & Haslam, 2010).
This approach to lean office design implies e.g. that: a) personal attributes are taken away
from the individual workplaces or from the work place as a whole and only working material
directly linked to the work is allowed, b) management marks clearly that it is the one who
decides how the office will be designed and used by employees, and finally c) a
"standardization" of the office design is pursued to the extent possible. This includes not only
the design of furniture, kitchen and pause areas or other facility areas within the office, but
also the layout as a whole, including number of rooms with different functions distributed per.
department. Even FM-facilities and use of ICT (Information Communication Technology) systems are included. This standardized approach to office design, where a rational and
impersonal approach to the individual workstation and the office as a whole is applied, aims
to free up time but also to clarify the focus on professionalism in the business that in the end
hopefully will lead to greater efficiency. This means that individuals and institutions are not
the controlling factors, instead it is a common standard designed to meet the needs of the
organization that is, and this must be kept (Duffy, 1999; Tapping & Shuker, 2002). This strict
standardization is not shared with the team-based lean office, which in this sense could
somewhat anti-Tayloristic (Pruijt, 2003).
In accordance to Tapping and Shuker (2003), who advocate the neo-Taylor approach, should
a lean office design eliminate the following seven different types of wastes in offices: 1)
waste of overproducing, 2) waste of waiting, 3) waste of over processing, (4) waste of
inventory, 5) waste of motion, 6) waste of defects or correction, and 7) waste of transport.
They describe however only how a few of these wastes will by the physical design of the
office be eliminated, these are: waste of inventory, waste of motion and waste of transport.
Waste of inventory (4), which refers to waste in the work process caused by the storage of
work material, is by standardized workstation design and equipment limited at both
workstations and the office as a whole, according to Tapping and Shuker (Ibid.). In addition
to this, can storage of work material be limited by a digital storage instead of physical storage,
but also by applying the 5S system, a system that aims to bring order and limit waste of space
at the workstation developed by Toyota. Work material is only to be stored in limited
locations within the office, since each time material is moved from one location to another
time is wasted. This should be done at: workstations, reference library for each team or
department, and final storage at the archive. The second waste described by Tapping and
Shuker is waste of motion (5), i.e. unnecessary motion within the workspace. This may, in
their view, be limited by a central placement of common office equipment such as typewriters
stations, copy machines, etc. They sometimes find it beneficial to have more of these common
stations within the office than what is required in order to cut down employees' movement
around the office during the work day. Waste of transport (7) should finally be avoided by an
architectural design that focuses on an efficient logistic system of goods within the office.
The main focus in the neo-Tayloristic approach to lean office is the work process. This is also
in focus in the team-based lean office, however not to the same extent. The flow of the work
process is thus reviewed carefully by the frequency of delivery of data and waiting for data
from colleagues and other providers in the process. The office design is in accordance with
this perspective a tool to achieve and maintain an efficient work process.
The main focus of the neo-Tayloristic approach of lean office is the work process. It is
recognized as important in the team-based lean office as well, however not to the same extent.
Here, the flow of work carefully examines according to frequency of delivery of data and
waits for data from colleagues and other providers in the process. In accordance with the neoTaylorstic approach is office design a tool to achieve and maintain an efficient work process.
The team-based lean office design
The other perspective on lean office design – the team-based lean office – has its main focus
on the team and how it can be used to encourage problem solving and learning in
organizations. The team is viewed as a key component to shorten lead times and make the
work more efficient, combined with other components such as creativity (Ekvall, 1996) and
leadership (Emiliani, 2008).
To enable the team-based lean office is a new employee's role necessary, the so-called
"authoritative producer," that means more power and responsibility on both the individual and
team level (Edwards et al., 2010). This new employee's role implies responsibility for the
conduct of its work, but also the planning and development as well as the incorporation of the
own work in the team's work process. It also implies a new role for the supervisor, who takes
a step back and avoid micro-management of the work and instead take overall responsibility.
The team-based lean office involves a rotation of the role as the team leader. The role of
authoritative producer emphasizes the individual employee's effort as important for the team's
work without the team's role is reduced. This work method is based on relational
coordination, i.e. the quality of work is dependent on relationships, which in turn is based on
clear common goals (P. Hines, M. Holweg, & N. Rich, 2004). A prerequisite for this is, in
turn, social capital in the form of good relations between employees and between employees
and managers. Leadership is a key component of this type of learning organizations (Emiliani,
2008) and we know that the "present leadership" is exercised through the spontaneous and
informal meetings within an organization (Kotter, 1982). These spontaneous and informal
meetings take place in an office at so-called "activity nodes," which is places that generates
activity (Bechtel, 1976). To enable present leadership in an organization, it is therefore
important in the team-based lean office, that the office architecture creates the physical
conditions for meetings and interaction to take place.
Discussion and Summary
Problematization of lean and its application in office design
There are problems with how to apply the lean concept to office design due to the fact that
there are several different implications to the concept (P. Hines et al., 2004), which makes it
hard to know what is referred to when lean office design is discussed. In addition to this, lean
is in itself very contradicting due to the use of the team concept, a fundamental component in
lean that is interpreted differently by different actors. The term did not exist in Toyota
Production System, from where lean originates, but was introduced by Womack, Jones and
Roos (2007) to understand the successful Toyota Production System when they launched
“lean production” in 1990 (Pruijt, 2003). According to Pruijt (Ibid.) was the term introduced
due to its association to medical teams, sport teams and teams of scientists, although in many
cases it was not how the term was applied when introduced in factories and offices, but it was
often rather a way to improve productivity through increased competition among members in
a team, but also between different teams. This approach is found in the found in the neoTayloristic lean office that uses bonus systems to increase productivity.
Womack, Jones and Roos (2007) describe lean production as method to learn professional
skills and apply these creatively in a team setting rather than in a rigid hierarchy (Womack et
al., 2007). The earlier described cooperating production, is one of the characteristics of lean
that aims to break hierarchies by applying more horizontal than a vertical control (Edwards et
al., 2010). Besides this, it overweighs achieving collective goals towards loyalty and
reliability, and holds great acceptance for conflicts and discussions since they viewed as
improvement methods. Despite cooperating production being fundamental to lean, some of
these fundamental components of cooperating production are hard to find in the neoTayloristic lean office. This is due to: a) its strong emphasis on standardization of the work
process that is related to reliability, but according to cooperating production should be of less
importance than collective goals, but also to b) the non-rotating team leader role in the neoTayloristic approach. This implies a hierarchical order in the team, since the team leader
reports to department manager and thereby achieves a higher hierarchical position in relation
to the other team members.
It is evident that it is not all clear what lean office design is. The two identified perspectives
on lean office design emphasize different aspects of lean, aspects that often seem to stand in
direct opposition to one another. An adequate question is therefore if they only are two
different approaches to office design that only share the same goal – to use the office design
as a tool to increase productivity in the work process. Because one could argue that they
beside the same goal are too different to be claimed to be different perspectives on the same
issue. The answer to the question is not evident. In this paper, we choose however to
emphasize the similarities rather than differences, and regard them thus as different sides of
the same coin, although we recognize the dilemma of doing this.
Concluding comments
In order to adapt lean better to the context of the individual organization choose many to only
work with some of the tools available in lean; this is also the case in lean office design. The
context is determined by line of business and what type of product/service that is provided
(Edwards et al., 2010). Research has shown that in order to successfully implement lean in the
office work, a less dogmatic approach must be applied in comparison with production
industry, where lean has its origin (ibid.). Architecture's traditionally different role in the
service and administrative sectors in comparison to the production industry should also be
considered here. In the two previous architecture has often been used to manifest the
individual business organization towards the own employees as well as the market (Duffy,
1999; Marmot & Ely, 2000). This may well affect not only the employees' perception of
architecture, but also its influence on them. Through a careful analysis of both work processes
and functions within the office, can large efficiency gains made through the architectural
design. This is independent of choice of lean office design approach applied and instead
dependent on the context of the business, as formerly described. However, it should be
notified that special attention is to be paid to standardization as it can be can it be a difficult
balancing act to find the appropriate level. Success is much about finding the right balance
and appropriate model for the specific organization, and continuously works with
improvements. This applies to the work process as well as office architecture.
Obstacles in the office architecture that hinder the work process may involve work functions
that should be near each other are separated from one another; or that certain teams or
departments that have a need for proximity to each other are physically located far apart. It
can also be that meetings and interaction is hampered by the architectural design due to the
plan layout, the quality of the room or the amount of activity nodes are limited within the
location of the team or within the office as a whole. Concerning meetings, it may not only be
a shortage of locations, it might just as well be bad habits concerning bookings of common
spaces within the office.
From a lean perspective are different degrees of open plan layout architecturally more
preferable than a cell-office plan layout. This is because the ability to visualize the work
process is easier in an open plan office, although there may well exist "walls" in an open plan
office. In other words physical or non-physical "walls" within an office, makes it difficult to
apply a lean tailored approach in the work process.
Acknowledgement
This research was supported by FAS, the Swedish Council for Working life and Social Research
(Postdoctoral grant 2011-0402).
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