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This "dropoff" coincides with a change in management philosophy in favor of "lean" organizations Can you describe what you mean by "lean" here? I'm a little c

This "dropoff" coincides with a change in management philosophy in favor of "lean" organizations Can you describe what you mean by "lean" here? I'm a little confused since the organisations I understand as following lean practices don't have the attributes that you talk about. Possibly this is a US/EU thing though...

CodeCube 15y ago
I don't think he means lean as in (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lean_manufacturing http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lean_manufacturing) ... but lean as in the literal definition: thin - meagre - meager - skinny - spare - gaunt - scraggy
mcantelon 15y ago
Basically cost-cutting, if I understand correctly. Mass layoffs were a management fad at one point and aggressive cost-cutting has been a staple of US corporate philosophy ever since.
michaelochurch 15y ago
"Lean" has a lot of meanings, but usually, it means "low in fat". The idea is that a company with a lower management ratio (say, 3-5) is flabby. The 1980s change in corporate structure was to "trim the fat". People are still debating whether this was good or bad, and certainly there were companies that had (and still do have) useless people in management, but the long-term verdict has been negative on the new structure. Managing people properly is too time-intensive for one person to have 20 reports.
- adrianhoward 15y ago
  Fair enough. Around where I tend to hang out when used in the context of organisations, especially technical ones, it usually refers to http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lean_manufacturing http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lean_manufacturing or http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lean_software_development http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lean_software_development - so I was confused :)
redler 15y ago
For some companies, the "lean philosophy" is a post hoc justification for stripping the workforce to the bare functional minimum, or even below. I think it's due to a combination of various pathological factors: the popular dogma that the responsibility to shareholders is to maximize profit to the greatest degree in the shortest possible time; the concomitant public company quarterly earnings treadmill and conflation of stock price with marketplace success; misaligned interests and perverse incentives among management and worker tiers; the "austerity yields prosperity" meme; lack of compensation-driven stakeholder mentality in top management; and the oversimplification fallacy that, especially with large entities, no matter how many pieces comprise the whole, one more can always be removed.

CodeCube 15y ago

I don't think he means lean as in (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lean_manufacturing http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lean_manufacturing) ... but lean as in the literal definition: thin - meagre - meager - skinny - spare - gaunt - scraggy

mcantelon 15y ago

Basically cost-cutting, if I understand correctly. Mass layoffs were a management fad at one point and aggressive cost-cutting has been a staple of US corporate philosophy ever since.

michaelochurch 15y ago

"Lean" has a lot of meanings, but usually, it means "low in fat". The idea is that a company with a lower management ratio (say, 3-5) is flabby. The 1980s change in corporate structure was to "trim the fat". People are still debating whether this was good or bad, and certainly there were companies that had (and still do have) useless people in management, but the long-term verdict has been negative on the new structure. Managing people properly is too time-intensive for one person to have 20 reports.

adrianhoward 15y ago
Fair enough. Around where I tend to hang out when used in the context of organisations, especially technical ones, it usually refers to http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lean_manufacturing http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lean_manufacturing or http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lean_software_development http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lean_software_development - so I was confused :)

redler 15y ago

For some companies, the "lean philosophy" is a post hoc justification for stripping the workforce to the bare functional minimum, or even below. I think it's due to a combination of various pathological factors: the popular dogma that the responsibility to shareholders is to maximize profit to the greatest degree in the shortest possible time; the concomitant public company quarterly earnings treadmill and conflation of stock price with marketplace success; misaligned interests and perverse incentives among management and worker tiers; the "austerity yields prosperity" meme; lack of compensation-driven stakeholder mentality in top management; and the oversimplification fallacy that, especially with large entities, no matter how many pieces comprise the whole, one more can always be removed.