Lean principles in IT services: a case study on implementation and best practices

Abstract

Lean methodologies are adopted into the information technology (IT) industry to eliminate waste and maximise business value to the customers. The global services models today provide ample scope to apply lean practices to IT services delivery and thereby to create robust partnerships between the vendors and the customers. The purpose of this paper is to identify some of the best practices in lean methodology as applicable to the IT service delivery and to exemplify the implementation in the context of a case study. The best practices mentioned in the paper are confined to our prioritisation of the observations and to identify the candidates that inject waste into the operations. A case study approach has been adopted to summarise the understanding and findings of our research. Many areas that inject waste into the IT services have been highlighted with supporting recommendations to eliminate such non-value added work.