22nd Annual Conference of the International Group for Lean Construction - Oslo, Norway - 2014

Supporting Organizational Design Towards Lean With the Viable System Model

Michael T. Schmidt1, Fatos Elezi2, Iris D. Tommelein3, Klas Berghede4 & Udo Lindemann5

1Graduate Student, University of California, Berkeley, USA and Technische Universität München, Germany, [email protected]
2M. Sc., Institute for Product Development, Technische Universität München, Germany, [email protected]
3Professor, Civil and Environmental Engineering Department, and Director of the Project Production Systems Laboratory (p2sl.berkeley.edu), 215-A McLaughlin Hall, Univ. of California, Berkeley, CA 94720-1712, USA, Phone +1 (510) 643-8678, [email protected]
4Production Manager, The Boldt Company, 455 Market Street, 5th Floor, CA 94105, San Francisco, [email protected]
5Professor, Institute for Product Development, Technische Universität München, Germany, [email protected]

Abstract

This paper provides an approach to support design of organizational control structures in lean construction projects. Abstracting and analyzing lean practices from the perspective of Management Cybernetics and the Viable System Model (ViSM) in particular was found to elevate understanding of the former in previous research. It seems promising to further investigate how applying the ViSM can aid the implementation of lean thinking in environments that face cultural- and other hurdles to sustainably establishing lean practices. To take further steps in this direction of research we present an approach for identification and design of organizational control structures in the context of lean practices utilizing the ViSM. Then, we present an exemplary application of said approach, showcasing supportive design of control structures within a pull-based material supply system at a hospital construction project in San Francisco, California. The example shows that the ViSM and its underlying principles of Management Cybernetics can largely support establishing control structures in lean context. Responsibility assignments and information channels could be transparently included in the organization structure and their assumed contribution to sustainable lean implementation could initially be verified.

Keywords

Management Cybernetics, Viable System Model, Lean Construction, lean control mechanisms, lean implementation

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Reference

Schmidt, M. T. , Elezi, F. , Tommelein, I. D. , Berghede, K. & Lindemann, U. 2014. Supporting Organizational Design Towards Lean With the Viable System Model, 22nd Annual Conference of the International Group for Lean Construction , 73-83. doi.org/

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Founded in 1993, the IGLC is an international network of researchers from practice and academia in architecture, engineering, and construction (AEC) who feel that the practice, education, and research of the AEC industry have to be radically renewed in order to respond to the global challenges ahead.

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