丰田模式：走下神坛

一切并非巧合。丰田在其获得最大成功的两个市场,也同时遭遇了前所未有的信任危机。当长期罩在丰田模式上的光环瞬间褪去,人们看到的或许就是一场营销游戏。     

论精益生产方式与全面质量管理的关系

从精益生产的理论形成为着力点,分析精益生产与全面质量管理的相互联系,明确精益生产的基本理论是符合现代质量管理的基本思想．彻底杜绝浪费以提高生产率正是全面质量管理所要求达到的高质量的目标。总结出精益生产必须以全面质量管理基本思想为指导,没有全面质量管理的基本理论指导就不可能创造出真正的精益生产方式,也就无法实现企业的创新与发展,最终将会被市场所淘汰.     

Two Routes to Team Production: Saturn and Chrysler Compared

This article explores two examples of new approaches to work organization with experienced workers in a unionized setting: General Motors' (GM's) Saturn Corporation and Chrysler's Jefferson North plant. Both represent variations of "team" production which differ markedly from stereotypical portraits of lean production. The article argues that the presence or absence of teams is less important than the manner in which they are integrated into the production process.     

精益建设过程中持续流的应用研究

:阐述了精益建设产生的理论基础 —— 精益生产理论,同时提出在精益建设中创建持续流创建的必要性。介绍了持续流的定义及其在建筑业中应用的意义,并对价值流中的增值活动进行了界定。确定价值流团队和作业测定组的组建,为创建持续流的准备工作。对持续流在建筑业的应用进行了分析,主要是运用价值流图和平衡生产线这两个方法加以实现。     

标准在企业走向国际市场中的作用

阐述了标准在企业生产经营活动中的作用，通过对国际标准、WTO、WTO/TBT协议的情况介绍，分析了标准对于开展国际贸易的重要性，明确了国际标准是WTO协议的技术基础，是消除贸易技术壁垒的有效手段；明晰了标准在企业走向国际市场中的作用即在新的经济形势下，标准不仅一如既往的在企业的生产和经营中发挥着重要的作用，而且在企业走向国际市场的过程中，又架起了通向国际市场的桥梁。     

Do private standards create exclusive supply chains? New evidence from the Peruvian asparagus export sector

Developing countries are increasingly exporting fresh horticultural products to high-income countries. These exports increasingly have to comply with stringent public and private standards, as well as other quality and safety issues. There is an ongoing debate on the effect of private standards on the inclusion of small-scale farmers in export supply chains. With this paper, we contribute to this debate by providing new evidence from the Peruvian asparagus export sector, and by addressing several important methodological shortcomings and gaps in the existing literature. We describe export dynamics using a unique firm level dataset on 567 asparagus export firms from 1993 to 2011 and the evolution of certification to private standards using own survey data from a stratified random sample of 87 export firms. We use an unbalanced panel of the surveyed companies on 19 years and several methods, including fixed effects and GMM estimators, to estimate the causal impact of certification to private standards on companies' sourcing strategy. We find that certification leads to vertical integration and significantly reduces the share of produce that is sourced from external producers, with a larger effect for small-scale producers. When distinguishing between production and processing standards, and between low-level and high-level standards, we find that especially high-level production standards have a negative impact on sourcing from (small-scale) producers.     

The Search for Flexibility: Skills and Workplace Innovation in the German Pump Industry

The German skill-creation system has been a vital part of the success of its 'diversified quality production' model. Some argue that this success is now threatened by the spread of lean production and that the existing skill-creation system may hinder, rather than help, German manufacturers to restructure. We explore this argument in a detailed study of a nationally representative sample of German pumpmakers. We find that the existence of a highly skilled work-force may deter the adoption of multifunctional work teams, but that countervailing strengths of the German skill-creation system have the potential to help firms develop a new, distinctive German production model.     

On leanness, agility and leagile supply chains

In 1999 a paper by Naylor, Naim and Berry on ‘leagility’ was published in international journal of production economics. The paper has attracted over 100 independent citations from over 60 journals of international standing. This paper explores the testing, exploitation and extension of the original work. Via a systematic literature review the notable findings are that the 1999 paper has been exploited in terms of its classification of supply chains into lean, agile and ‘leagile’; those terms have been tested via survey and case based empirical research; has been extended beyond the original stock decoupling point exploitation of lean and agile to encompass other forms of ‘leagility’. This paper concludes that further robust testing of ‘leagility’ and the definitions of leanness and agility are still required to encompass different market sectors and ensure triangulation of research methods.     

Lean planning in the semi-process industry, a case study

The lean approach is an idealizing improvement approach that has an enormous impact in the field of operations management. It started in the automotive industry and has since been widely applied in discrete manufacturing. However, extensions to the (semi-) process industry have been much slower. Resource characteristics of the (semi-) process industry obstruct a straightforward application. The notion of the point of discretization for the (semi-) process industry is helpful here. This notion builds on the fact that in most (semi-) process industries there is a point in production where process production turns into discrete production. Downstream of this point lean principles are applicable in a straightforward manner, while upstream lean needs to be interpreted in a more liberal way. In this article we address this issue by a case study. The study considers how the principles of ‘flow’ and ‘pull’ production - suggesting a regular, demand-driven product flow - may be implemented for the (semi-) process industry by introducing cyclic schedules. The conjectures guiding the case study are: (i) Cyclic schedules fit in a lean improvement approach for the semi-process industry, (ii) Cyclic schedules help to improve production quality and supply-chain coordination and (iii) Discrete event simulation is a useful tool in facilitating a participative design of a cyclic schedule. The case study is extensively described to be able to judge how the context of the changes and the intervention process contribute to the results of the intervention.     

‘All they lack is a chain’: lean and the new performance management in the British civil service

The adaptation of lean techniques in public services is viewed as an innovative managerialist response to government demands for more efficient services amidst large reductions in public spending. This paper explores workers' experiences of the impact of lean on work organisation and control and provides new insights into developments within contemporary back office clerical work.     

Formal standards-setting for global telecommunications and information services. Towards an institutional regime transformation?

This paper reviews the nature and economic significance of the activities carried on by standards development organizations (SDOs), focusing in particular upon the telecommunications and information technology standards-setting work of the government-created public and quasi-public institutions, and the international treaty organizations that constitute the formal standards sector. It documents the current sources of tension within this regime and appraises various proposals for organizational reforms. There are especially pressing needs for adaptations of the inherited institutional mechanisms for technical coordination to provide for inter-operability in the development of new telecommunication networks and services. Among the manifold sources of strain on the old structure, those which seem at once most fundamental and potentially most threatening are the recently heightened industrial perceptions of the potential strategic value of standards as tools of business competition and national policy, and the incentives for ‘institutional by-pass’ that have been created by the rapid proliferation of technological possibilities. The paper considers some alternative organizational models for negotiated standard-setting that might be able to withstand, and better harness these forces for the continued production of standards as public goods.     

Certifying catfish in Vietnam and Bangladesh: Who will make the grade and will it matter?

Certification is an increasingly pervasive form of market governance through which retailers and NGOs are able to exert control over producers of primary products in order to secure their commercial and institutional interests. This paper assesses the likely outcomes of emerging certification standards intended to govern production of a new global commodity, Pangasius catfish. This evaluation focuses on Pangasius producers in Vietnam and Bangladesh, and one of the key areas which standards seek to regulate; the environment. We conclude that certification is likely to result in greater differentiation and polarisation between larger and smaller farm operators and will increasingly act to exclude of the latter from access to Western European and North American markets, and that any local environmental gains produced may be of relatively minor significance.     

Lean Launch: Managing Product Introduction Risk Through Response-Based Logistics

New product launch research has identified four strategic issues that involve activities essential to introduce a new product to its target market. The sum of these decisions is critical to new product success. Substantial research has focused on decisions guiding the proper product, price, and promotion mix to favorably impact market goals. Considerably less research has centered on determining how place capabilities such as logistics and supply chain relationships impact launch performance. Logistics and supply chain collaboration—the processes involved in planning, implementing, and controlling the efficient, effective flow and storage of goods, services, and related information from the point of origin to point of consumption for the purpose of conforming to customer requirements—can greatly reduce risk associated with new product launch. They combine to provide a structure to facilitate rapid response to developing demand by location and intensity. In this article, an effort is made to fill the gap in extant knowledge regarding new product launch strategies by reviewing relevant literature and comparing traditional launch strategies based on anticipatory demand forecasts with alternative lean launch strategies based on the principles of response-based logistics. The result is a lean launch model for continued empirical testing and managerial review. The article contrasts traditional logistics support of new product launch with an emerging logic called lean launch strategy. The traditional launch strategy is forecast driven and is based on anticipatory logistics (push). The lean launch strategy is formulated on principles of postponement and is based on response-based logistics (pull) and supply chain management. Response-based logistics systems provide flexibility that enables better management of inventory levels. Improved replenishment times and in-stock availability of products from a centralized inventory allows managers to rapidly react to actual demand. Lean launch enhances successful introduction by allowing greater flexibility in product variant selection while minimizing out-of-stock potential. Lean launch also can cut losses in product launch failures by reducing launch inventory exposure. Finally, lean launch can improve chances of new product success by helping limited volume technical successes achieve profitability.     

Buy or make? Agricultural production diversity,markets and dietary diversity in Afghanistan

Increasing on-farm production diversity and improving markets are recognized as ways to improve the dietary diversity of smallholders. Using instrumental variable methods to account for endogeneity, we study the interplay of production diversity, markets and diets in the context of seasonality in Afghanistan. We confirm an important seasonal dimension to the interplay. Improved crop diversity over the year is positively associated with dietary diversity in the regular season, but not in the lean season. Livestock species diversity remains important for dietary diversity throughout the year, but particularly so in the lean season when the influence of cropping diversity is low. Market aspects become important for dietary diversity specifically in the lean season.     

The impact of lean practices on inventory turnover

Lean manufacturing (LM) is currently enjoying its second heyday. Companies in several industries are implementing lean practices to keep pace with the competition and achieve better results. In this article, we will concentrate on how companies can improve their inventory turnover performance through the use of lean practices. According to our main proposition, firms that widely apply lean practices have higher inventory turnover than those that do not rely on LM. However, there may be significant differences in inventory turnover even among lean manufacturers depending on their contingencies. Therefore, we also investigate how various contingency factors (production systems, order types, product types) influence the inventory turnover of lean manufacturers. We use cluster and correlation analysis to separate manufacturers based on the extent of their leanness and to examine the effect of contingencies. We acquired the data from the International Manufacturing Strategy Survey (IMSS) in ISIC sectors 28-35.     

精益建设理论及其实施研究

章介绍了精益生产和精益思想的具体理论，由精益思想在建设领域中运用引申出精益建设含义，分析了建设项目过程中精益思想的具体体现，构建了精益建设系统的基本框架，研究了精益建设的具体实施方法，以及发展精益建设需注意的问题。     

Antitrust Versus Regulatory Merger Review: The Case of Electricity

This paper focuses on the implications of multi-agency review of electricity mergers. It highlights fundamental differences between regulatory and antitrust merger enforcement procedures–ranging from standards of review to data collection, economic analysis, and remedies. Such disparities potentially introduce costly and potentially conflicting redundancy into the merger review process. Illustrative examples are drawn from a number of cases, including apparent inconsistencies across applicant-filed analyses in FERC merger cases. Absent the delegation of competition analysis to the antitrust agencies, the paper makes the case for harmonizing review across regulators and antitrust enforcers.     

Adoption of a Process Innovation with Learning-by-Doing: Evidence from the Semiconductor Industry

This article analyzes the adoption of a new process technology in the global semiconductor manufacturing industry. The paper extends research on the relationship between learning-by-doing and technology adoption by examining the stability of learning effects across technological generations. While the results indicate that production experience with the immediately preceding technological generation is associated with a higher likelihood of adoption, we find no evidence that experience with older technologies or regional knowledge spillovers influence adoption. Finally, the results indicate that large firms and memory manufacturers have a higher likelihood of adoption than small firms and non-memory manufacturers, respectively.     

国内外钻井工程标准对比分析

对我国钻井国家标准、行业标准,ISO(国际标准化组织)和国外先进标准,包括API(美国石油学会)、IADC(国际钻井承包商协会)标准,全面系统地进行了对比分析,研究了标准项目涵盖范围、标准的具体内容,找出我国钻井标准与国际国外先进标准的差别与不足。建议我国重视标准的修订、钻井新技术标准的制定和及时采标工作,这对我国钻井工程标准的完善有着重要指导作用。