Lean Management of Environmental Consulting

Abstract

Lean management has traditionally been adopted by manufacturing industries to improve operations through the identification and elimination of all forms of waste. Encouraged by the successful integration of lean principles in service industries, this article provides an investigation into the applicability of lean management principles to improve business operations in an environmental consulting company. An organized approach of applying the five fundamental concepts of lean management (specify value, identify the value stream, flow, pull, and perfection) is presented in a manner that environmental managers may use as a model to achieve specific operational goals. Examples are presented to illustrate how lean concepts were applied at two environmental consulting firms.