In response to the recent economy's woes, banks have placed a growing premium on reducing costs and improving operational efficiencies and many banks have turned to lean programs as a useful tool. Most of these banks will find themselves disappointed, however, because few lean initiatives, in our experience, deliver the expected results. The near and longer-term impact on costs proves to be far less than expected, and any gains in efficiency prove to be either temporary or too limited in scope to make a real difference. There is no fundamental, lasting change in the way the bank conducts its operations and hence little impact on long-term performance. The problem is not with lean itself, however. Indeed, we believe that lean has much to offer banks. The problem lies in the approach and implementation. Typically, banks go wrong in one of two ways. One, they apply lean too narrowly and from too limited a perspective. There is no cohesive, end-to-end view of the process itself or the alignment of all of its elements. Alternatively, the effort is driven solely from the top down and fails to engage and involve the key people who actually perform the critical tasks within the process. This leads to a lack of process ownership and accountability. The end result, in either case, is that the lean effort delivers only a fraction of its potential benefits.
About the Author: About The Author: Ade Asefeso MCIPS MBA Ade has packed a lot into his career over the years with a long spell working at senior level within various manufacturing companies in the UK. He can be described as international diplomat due to his work across the globe. Ade spent a lot of his time representing various companies either at supply chain level, operational level, sales and marketing level, and senior executive level across Asia, North America, Africa, Eastern and Western Europe. Ade is currently the CEO of AA Global Sourcing Ltd. A company that helps local businesses outsource so that they can enjoy the benefits that used to be enjoyed by big corporations for years. All this still doesn't make mention of Ade's increasingly successful career as an author, of numerous books on Finance, Business Ideas, Personal Development, Self help, CEO Guide to Doing Business, Outsourcing, Lean IT, Lean Manufacturing, Agile and Lean Office, Lean Office, Six Sigma, Six Sigma Healthcare, Six Sigma marketing, Six Sigma Service, Lean Startup, Lean Procurement, Lean Implementation, 5S for Supervisors, 5S Home, Lean Handbook, Lean marketing, Lean Sales and marketing, Lean Accounting, Lean Management, Lean Healthcare, 5S for Healthcare, 5S Office Management, Lean In Construction, Lean Retailing, Lean Banking, TPM Simplified, Green Manufacturing, Supply Chain Management, Real estate, Balanced Scorecard Non Executive Director, CEO Tools, Corporate Storytelling, Reshoring and Online Marketing. In his spare time, although it's amazing to think that he might have some, Ade does keep fit.