Lean Project Management Implementation

This document discusses the implementation of Lean Project Management methodologies in organizations. It explores the benefits of implementing Lean Project Management, such as maximizing value and minimizing waste. The document also highlights the critical success factors and steps to ensure successful implementation.

Running head: LEAN PROJECT MANAGEMENT IMPLEMENTATION
Lean Project Management Implementation
Name of the Student
Name of the University
Author Note

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MEMORANDUM
TO: [Insert Addressee]
FROM: [Insert Sender]
CC: [Insert Addressee]
DATE: [Insert Date]
SUBJECT: Lean Project Management Principles Implementation
The concept of Lean Project management Implementation in a particular Project
Management Consultancy is the way by which the entire focus of the organization is based
not just on the ways by which the organization needs to complete a proper project but also the
ways by which an organization focuses entirely on the ways by which the project
management procedure proposes ways to cut waste and at the same time focuses on the
reduction of costs (Sunder, 2016). The lean manufacturing processes have been emphasized
in order to proceed with the concepts of lean manufacturing that helps in providing an
organization with all the proceeding of the progression of the project. There have been
various reasons found for an organization to quit the Project Management Methodologies for
the manufacturing of the projects and services and instead apply the methodologies for the
Lean Project Management. It has also been found that there are various findings witnessed
that have declared that the Lean Project management methods have been facing various
benefits due to the implementation of the lean project management methodologies. Thus, it is
required that organizations understand the utility of the lean project management and apply
them in order to enjoy the benefits provided by the procedures, and at the same time it is also

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required that the organization also understands the constraints of the implementation of the
project management phases when Lean Methodologies are applied.
Thus, this particular memorandum will approach why this organization needs to
implement Lean Project Management Features within the organization to provide services or
the products to the customers and what would be the procedures for reviewing the
implications of the project to make sure that the Lean Project Management Methodology
application is appropriate and all the risks associated are mitigated.
KEY POINTS
Initial reason for implementing LPM
The production of the organization in providing the customers with the products and
services has been aesthetically proper in the organization. It is not that the organization has
not been able to cope up with the projects that it has been taking up to provide the customers
with, however, it would further elevate the entire business process of the organization. There
are various reasons that an organization can gain various benefits from the adaptation of lean
project management methodologies (Babalola, Ibem & Ezema, 2018). The reasons why this
particular organization needs to implement the lean project management methodologies needs
to be justified for the memorandum as well.
The primary or chief reason that Lean Project Management needs to be implemented
within the organization is the maximization of the values and minimization of the wastage.
Normally, it is found that the normal Project Management methodologies are often found to
be creating delays in work or having problems while the project progression phases during
which, random changes in requirements and the project phases create delays in work. Every
delay within a project phase happens to be impacting negatively on the project and in this

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way it would be better if the project management methodologies depended upon the lean
project management methodologies for formulating the project processes (Tezel et al., 2015).
This would only be formulated because the initial requirement of the project was created to
add value to the business organization, which also has the potential to be not implemented.
However, it would be beneficial if the Lean Project Management methodologies be
implemented, this is because it would be adding value to the business and all the issues
within the project that can cause potential risk to the otherwise normal project management
methodology.
The reason why the organization would find it beneficial to implement the project
management methodologies with lean methods is only to add more and more value to the
business. This is regarding the ways by which the organizations have been handling the
business process and the project management methodologies (Albliwi et al., 2017). The value
in the business would only be implemented when the limited resources are utilized to produce
the appropriate products and services to the customers. Although, the lean methodology has
been first initiated from the shop or factory floors, it is not just a manufacturing technique but
also a way by which both the production and the manufacturing phase, even the service
provision phases can benefit from.
The basic lean project management was first implemented with the help of taking
inspiration from manufacturing processes from Toyota. These were inspired to manage a lot
of things within an organisation to make sure that the project management is completed in the
most feasible way possible. The ideologies that and maintained in a lean project management
can be listed as follows:
Muda: This is a Japanese term to depict the elimination of wastage. This is
characterized by deploying of the resources in such a way that this just not only adds value to

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a project progression to deliver the benefits but also eliminates all the added waste that is
generated from the deploying of resources.
Muri: The Japanese term which translates to overburdening also can cause a lot of
problems to the way in which an organisation handles its projects (Elias, 2016). This idea is
removed from the project management in a lean procedure that reduces the stuffed staffing of
employees and makes them much more productive under pressure and stress. The removal of
waste products in this stage also reduces overburdening of the employees and helps them in
delivering better results and respects the resources to be used.
Mura: This Japanese term for inconsistency is reduced in the lean project
management way that helps in in maintaining consistency within a project and standardise the
procedures within the project progression (Elias, 2016).
Therefore, the Lean Project management Methodologies should be implemented
within the organization so that the organization can look forward to implement the
methodologies to make sure that the business utilizes the least amount of resources from the
organization to provide the best possible products adhering to the requirements of the
customers as well as the requirements of the organization as well.
Benefits that can be gained by the various stakeholders in a project from
implementing LPM
The stakeholders within the organizations are the people that have the potential of
being affected by the outcomes of the project. The stakeholders are identified to be the people
involved directly or indirectly within the project (Anholon & Sano, 2016). This helps in
identifying the people that are directly related to the project management and the people who
have been directly related to the project who would be sponsoring or monitoring the project.

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At the same time, the people who would be delivered the end product of the lean project
management would be considered as one of the stakeholders as well.
With the implementation of the Lean Project Management procedures within the
organization, it is also kept in consideration to provide the best results of the project to the
stakeholders as well, not just the customers who would be at the receiving end of the project.
Any project implemented within the organization is not considered to be a successful one if
the project outcome or even the project progression does not appeal or provide benefit to the
project stakeholders (Dasig , 2017). This is why, it is required that the stakeholders also gain
from the outcomes of the project and not just the customers would be enjoying the end
product. With the addition of this lean project management within the organisation, following
would be the benefits that the stakeholders would enjoy:
Higher productivity: Any business executive and sponsors who have in investing in
a particular project for an organisation automatically looks forward to a higher productivity
rate utilising the resources that they are providing to the employees for the project. If the
resources produce huge amount of product, that would be an added benefit to the
stakeholders (Timans et al., 2016).
Better efficiency: It always occurs that the lean project management implementation
within an organisation produces a better efficient production of services for manufacturing of
organisation specific products (Laureani & Antony, 2018). This is what initiates production
of efficient requirements as per the organisation and the stakeholders demand from a
particular organisation for the project.
Higher quality: The sponsors of a project looking forward towards production of
higher quality product in exchange of the facility that provide to the organisation. The
finances that they are arranging for the project are given a better utilisation of the resources to

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produce a much higher quality product and provide them (Bortolotti, Boscari & Danese,
2015). This is also not just for the sponsors but for the end users and other stakeholders as
well since the production of higher quality product with obviously benefit the organisation
fulfilling the requirements of the stakeholders.
Higher profit margins: The executives within a project always look forward to the
production of the manufacturing or services to be as per the requirements of the customers.
The lean project management ensures that the project perfectly insurers the fulfilling of the
customer requirements providing a much higher profit margin gained through customer
satisfaction.
Faster production and low inventory cost: The stakeholders are always looking
forward to the production of higher quality products with the utilisation of the resources
(Oakland & Marosszeky, 2017). It is possible that with the implementation of lean project
management methodologies, the inventory costs be deducted, and at the same time the
production happens at a much faster rate than usual.
Critical Success Factors and the steps by which CSF proposition can be ensured
The Critical Success Factors or CSF needs to be in placed within the consultancy
organisation to achieve successful implementation of Lean Project Management. Applying in
project management to organisations already existing project management features only
enhances the success factors of the organisation in achieving their desired goals (Mkhaimer,
Arafeh & Sakhrieh, 2017). Following would be a summarisation of the critical success factor
that an organisation can achieve for implementing the lean project management programs so
that the organisation can and bring about essential competitive advantages much more than
its competitors in the market. The critical success factors would be the following:

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Committing essentially to the lean program: The practitioners and mostly of the
opinion that the managerial commitment is primarily working as a critical success factor
behind the lean project management. They tend to perceive the matter to be implementing
success irrespective of the size of the organisation, their location or any other factor. It is
however not enough that a manager leads from the office but also as to get involved within
the project manufacturing right at the shop floor personally. This also involves the act of
communication, which not only e is comments write the initial stage of the project planning
and at the end of the project closure but goes on throughout the project progression phases.
On the other hand, it can also be said that the critical success factor of lean project
management is imbibed on the association of the entire project team of the organisation by
committing to clean project progression.
Training of the workforce: It is also important that the training and education of lean
production is followed throughout to the entire workforce to make sure that the lean project
management is engrossed within the employees. This acts as a critical success factor to the
organisation. If the employees within the organisation are not aware of the knowledge that
lean project management brings about there is no point that the plant body organisation
would succeed with the implementation (Douglas, Douglas & Ochieng, 2015). It is the
manager that is primarily required initially to be aware of the lean project management and
its application, and then it is required that during the early stage of lean implementation the
external consultancy firm or even the corporate resources within the organisation helps in
building knowledge about lean project management. It can also be improved within the
organisation that a benchmark is set to implement the lean and make the entire project team
within the organisation be aware of the accumulated knowledge that would be considered for
continuing the use of lean project management within the organisation.

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Planning and following up: It is not this important to plan but also to follow up the
plan is extremely important to add critical success factor to an organisation through the
implementation of lean project management (Marodin & Saurin, 2015). The different steps of
the plan should be engrossed with breaking down the entire plan into several levels. The
clearly define performance target and its monitoring facilities make sure that the managers
integrate the lean in everyday business. When the organisation learns to make it a part of the
organisation rather than putting it on a separate project or a temporary project, then become
successful and adds critical success factor to the organisation.
Allocation of resources and sharing of the gains: It is required that resources are
assisted towards the implementation of lean project management, so that critical success
factors could be added to the organisation with its implementation. It is difficult when an
organisation applies the lean project management within an organisation before making it
knowledgeable for all the employees in the team (Irina et al., 2016). It is also important that a
rewards and recognition scheme is implemented within the organisation so that the gain can
be shared amongst all the employees that have been involved within the project. It is found
that due to this rewards and recognition face the employees become motivated and they help
in adding up of their skills to the lean project management, making the organisation gain
much more.
Using lean project management tools and methodologies: The usage of lean
project management tools and methodologies adds a lot of critical success factor to the
organisation as they help in the reduction of waste, problem solving, visualisation, continuous
improvement, team concept, daily management, stream mapping, value addition and success.
All these tools added to the organisation and effective and necessary for succeeding with the
application of lean project management within the organisation.

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Achievement of the LPM mind-set within the consultancy staff
For implementing the lean project management, the consultancy staff needs to clarify
their mind set in implementing the lean project management within the organisation and it is
our duty to make sure that the organisation has a process of correctly implementing in project
management within the organisation (Pham & Pham, 2017). This would be achieved by the
core principles of implementing the lean project management with the help of the
consultancy staff as below:
 Preparing the team for the change: Implementation of the lean project
management in the organisation is obviously a change management procedure.
This is because; the previous project management methodologies are getting
replaced by the LPM procedures (Gutierrez-Gutierrez, De Leeuw & Dubbers,
2016). Therefore the staffs need to be made sure of the goal that your
organisation is trying to achieve and motivate them to take on the change and
carry on the journey with entire organisation.
 Introduce the principles of lean project management: The people within
the organisation including the employees need to be aware of the principles of
lean project management and this is the responsibility of the consultancy staff
to identify the need of educating the staff with the project management
principles.
 Visualise the value stream of the organisation: It is important that the
consultancy staff understand what the organisation needs to increase the value
of the organisation and at the same time deliver the same.

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Description of the training requirements for individual staff
It is important that the lean project principles be chained to the individual staff in the
organisation as well and for this the employees at all levels should go through the training
procedures for learning lean principles. This can be deduced as follows:
 The management team should first and foremost be made aware of the
definition of lean principles throughout (Noori, 2015). The entire management
team should gather around and talked about the areas where the lean project
principles should be utilised for setting up a room for improvement and
reducing the waste.
 The management principles should be assigned rules to share the
responsibility and implement strategies as well as documenting all the
processes and procedures that would be applied.
 Ihe identification of waste should be done next to eliminate them from the
organisation including overproduction, non-value-added processes,
transportation, motion waste, inventory waste, waste of unsafe conditions,
waste of defective products, searching waste, human energy waste and waste
for unsafe conditions.
 The Kaizen method should be adopted in this training procedure. This should
engage the employees for actively taking part in the incremental development
of the company in a regular basis. Therefore the culture of continuous
improvement would be facilitated as a by-product of the lean principal
implementation.

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Method to assess when the consultancy has sufficiently adopted the LPM
approach to be able to tender for government work
It is not important that the lean project management principles is implemented within
an organisation but there also needs to be methods developed for the entire process to assess
the lean project management approaches with the help of consultancy to make sure that the
organisation is able to tender for government work as well (Belhadi & Touriki, 2016). In
most cases application of the six sigma approaches of lean project management is necessary
to be implemented within an organisation, but it is more appropriate if the agile in project
management is implemented within the project process setup of an organisation to make sure
that the manufacturing errors are reduced at the least. This ensures the government metrics
for large and small organisations in standardizing the review of implementation of lean
project management and the outcomes of the project as well. When consultancy ensures that
the agile project management strategy is implemented with the help of Six Sigma, it brings
about more influence of the maintenance strategies by an organisation, not just by adding
much more influential value of the project outcomes but also follows a standardization
process. This enables the company to become eligible to tender for government affiliated
works as well.
Conclusion
Therefore in conclusion it can be said that it is an appropriate strategy to implement
the lean project management principles within the organisation. This is due to the fact that the
organisation would only gain the benefits that are offered by the lean project management
principles and this is confirmed in the entire memorandum through various aspects of the lean
project management implementation. The memorandum has specified key points through
which the lean project management can be implemented within the organisation and what

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would be the outcomes. The key points of the entire memorandum included the initial reason
for implementing lean project management, the benefits that the organisation can gain with
the infiltration of various stakeholders in the project with implementation process, the critical
success factors and the steps by which the critical success factor proposition can be insured,
the achievement of the lean project management mind-set within the consultancy staff the
description of the training requirements for individual staff and the method to assess when the
consultancy has sufficiently adopted the lean project management approach to be able to
tender for government work.

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