BLEU – Enterprise Excellence

Since the publication in 1996 of Lean Thinking (Womack and Jones), ‘Lean’ has established itself as the most effective and most widely adopted improvement methodology for operations in the world. With roots in the Toyota Production System and in earlier approaches, Lean has expanded vertically into accounting, marketing, HR, IT, design and R&D, and logistics, and horizontally into service, health, government, and banking. Lean is now integrated with other effective approaches including Agile, Systems Thinking, Theory Of Constraints (TOC) and Six Sigma.

BLEU members and staff come from a wide variety of backgrounds, disciplines and schools of thought but all share a common goal. To research, record, innovate and teach the fundamental concepts essential to Enterprise Excellence.

Enterprise excellence – value lifecycle

Lean Enterprise Value LifecycleUnderstanding “value” is at the heart of Enterprise Excellence. Whilst ‘Lean’ is all about creating more value using fewer resources the ‘future proof’ organisation is one which simultaneously optimises the way it carries out its current activities whilst creating future value and therefore direction. We believe the “value lifecycle” and the circular economy underpin Enterprise Excellence.

BLEU academic pathway

Academic learning and qualification pathwayThe BLEU team have been running successful MSc programmes since 1999 and have built a strong international reputation. The team is made up of recognised, world-class professionals, industry experts and thought-leaders. This means all of our programmes, courses and events deliver a unique combination of academic rigour and real-world practicality.

We offer a practical and unique academic learning and qualification pathway. This is delivered through a blend of events, courses and programmes. Your own pathway could start with attendance at a single event and go on to the achievement of a Professional Doctorate.

The MSc in Lean Enterprise is our flagship programme, launched at the University of Buckingham in 2010, but developed and extended from our team’s 15 years’ experience running the MSc in Lean Operations previously.

The programme is specifically designed for practising managers. The philosophy of the programme is that Lean can only effectively be learned with hands-on practice. Hence, a considerable part of the programme is held on-site at manufacturing and service locations. Participants take part in real exercises (not just case studies) in several organisations in several sectors.  The student group is deliberately small to allow both practical hands-on participation and personal interaction with some of the leading practitioners in the UK.

BLEU academic pathway – design your own

As customer value is fundamental to our thinking we recognise that not all customers and circumstances are the same. If your organisation has specific requirements that aren’t exactly matched by our academic pathway then we are able to tailor the content, delivery mechanism and qualification. This could include on-site delivery, online modules, project mentoring, certification and consultancy support.

BLEU academic pathway – short courses

ElementsWe call our short courses Elements. This is for three reasons. Firstly, they are all elements based on the content and structure of the flagship MSc programmes secondly, like the elements in the periodic table they can be attended or delivered individually and thirdly, like elements they can be combined together to make a variety of products and modules. They are all run on both an open and bespoke basis, the latter involving tailored courses designed to meet the needs of specific organisations. The elements short courses are grouped under the following themes;

  • Foundations
  • Quality and Systems Thinking
  • Demand, Capacity and Flow
  • Lean and JIT Tools
  • Kaizen, TWI and Kata
  • People and Leadership
  • Performance, Measures and Flow
  • Innovation Capability and Execution
  • Service Excellence

BLEU philosophy

BLEU members and staff come from a wide variety of backgrounds, disciplines and schools of thought but all share a common philosophy and set of values.

Features of our approach include:

  • We define Lean Thinking and Continuous Improvement widely – viewing them as a philosophy rather than a set of tools and methodologies. This philosophy encompasses all key business processes, linking business strategy and goals.
  • We consider that Lean and Continuous Improvement are not just a cost reduction tool kits concerned with waste removal but are mainly concerned with enhancing stakeholder value by releasing or creating capacity for growth and the realisation of benefits.
  • Whilst we maintain that the definition of lean thinking and CI is wide, we continue to challenge and question its relevance and strive to continually move thinking forward.
  • We believe that it is essential to link lean and CI practice with academic theory, so we continue to bring world-class thinkers and practitioners together with academics to challenge thinking and develop new theories.

BLEU – What previous students have said

  • QUOTE 1: Many challenging concepts that could generate real benefit.
  • QUOTE 2: Diversity of viewpoints and challenging concepts.