I work in a large institution that has recently adopted a Lean (Holweg, 2007 as cited by Al-Haddad & Kotnour, 2015) approach to management. Algonquin College, like other higher-education institutions, has moved to a business model and have had a growth model in a time when other institutions have focused on maintenance; at a time when the student population is changing, and technology continues to change rapidly.

According to Al-Haddad & Kotnour (2015) Lean focusses on producing what is needed, when it is needed, with the minimum amount of materials, and focuses on the people, the process, and the product. It is a production model. As one of many contract workers, a system that focuses on trimming the waste is somewhat daunting. It has seemed to me, from observation, that there is a lot of fear in the response from the employees; fear of loss of jobs, fear of loss of values, and fear of loss of old ways of doing things. Considering the theme I have observed in our readings these past weeks of the importance of aligning values with your teams, this is concerning when I think about the cost of implementing these changes.

Weller & Anderson (2013) offer a change model based on the theory of ecological resilience. The three factors impacting resilience in this model are:

  • Diversity: not being dependent on one crop or livelihood.
  • Modularity: a degree of self-reliance and protection from outside events, such as local food supplies.
  • Tightness of feedbacks: making the consequences of actions apparent to everyday life.

(Hopkins, 2009, as cited by Weller and Anderson, 2013)

Considering these factors, I was struck by the possible challenge of maintaining a lean system that encourages diversity. One thing I hope our college will continue to do well is to allow faculty and curriculum designers freedom, and to thoroughly evaluate outcomes for students. This strikes me as one way that an institution can simultaneously increase diversity and alignment of values, by not forcing faculty to do things a certain way. For example, some faculty are very resistant to incorporating new technologies because they have observed, through trial and error, that these tools have not fit their model of teaching, while others have great success.

Respecting these differences, educating faculty in the application of new technology to encourage guided experimentation, and looking at the outcomes rather than imposing a top down design may help give faculty room to adjust to change more authentically and holistically while ensuring our institution is more resilient.

References

Al-Haddad, S., & Kotnour, T. (2015). Integrating the organizational change literature: a model for successful change. Journal of Organizational Change Management, 28(2), 234-262.

Holweg, M. ( 2007 ), ” The genealogy of lean production “, Journal of Operations Management , Vol. 25 No. 2, pp. 420 – 437 .

Hopkins, R. (2009). Resilience Thinking. Resurgence, 257

Weller, M., & Anderson, T., (2013). Digital Resilience in Higher Education. European Journal of Open Distance and E-Learning, 16(1), 53-66