TY  - CONF
TI  - From Projects to Systems: the Alberta Facilities Production System (AFPS)
C1  - Osaka and Kyoto, Japan
C3  - Proceedings of the 33rd Annual Conference of the International Group for Lean Construction (IGLC 33)
SP  - 1333
EP  - 1344
PY  - 2025
DO  - 10.24928/2025/0294
AU  - Shehab, Lynn
AU  - Russell, Jason
AU  - Hamzeh, Farook
AD  - PhD Candidate, Civil and Environmental Engineering Dept., Hole School of Construction Engineering,
University of Alberta, Edmonton, Canada, lshehab@ualberta.ca, https://orcid.org/0000-0002-2708-3550
AD  - Project Manager, MSc Student, Civil and Environmental Engineering Dept., Hole School of Construction Engineering, University of Alberta, Edmonton, Canada, jcrussel@ualberta.ca, https://orcid.org/0009-0007-7030-8384
AD  - Associate Professor, Civil and Environmental Engineering Dept., Hole School of Construction Engineering,
University of Alberta, Edmonton, Canada, hamzeh@ualberta.ca, https://orcid.org/0000-0002-3986-9534
ED  - Seppänen, Olli 
ED  - Koskela, Lauri 
ED  - Murata , Koichi 
AB  - The integration of academia-industry collaboration has a crucial role in advancing innovation and improving efficiency in the construction industry. Most of these collaborations remain fragmented, with academia pursuing theoretical research while industry focuses on practical business first execution. This is one of the obstacles to making Lean implementations truly effective, since continuous learning, adaptation, and system-wide integration are essential for such implementations. Although the benefits of Lean production systems are well-documented, construction projects tend to adopt isolated Lean tools on an individual project basis, lacking a structured framework for sustained implementation across many projects. This paper introduces the Alberta Facilities Production System (AFPS), a conceptual framework that bridges the academia-industry gap through the integration of Lean principles into large-scale public sector construction. Inspired by the Toyota Production System (TPS), AFPS ensures that academic research reinforces industry practice, while industry challenges and experiences drive academic research. The University of Alberta serves as a "Live Lab" to test, refine, and scale Lean strategies, in order to eventually optimize construction processes. By establishing a structured and data-driven partnership between academia and industry, AFPS aims to promote continuous improvement, waste reduction, and knowledge transfer. This paper contributes a roadmap that will help governments, universities, and industry practitioners collaborate effectively and efficiently.
KW  - Lean methods
KW  - PDCA cycle
KW  - academia-industry integration
KW  - collaborative framework
KW  - continuous improvement.
PB  - 
T2  - Proceedings of the 33rd Annual Conference of the International Group for Lean Construction (IGLC 33)
DA  - 2025/06/02
CY  - Osaka and Kyoto, Japan
L1  - http://iglc.net/Papers/Details/2435/pdf
L2  - http://iglc.net/Papers/Details/2435
N1  - Export Date: 02 June 2025
DB  - IGLC.net
DP  - IGLC
LA  - English
ER  -