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For most manufacturers, on-time delivery is seen as a bonus, not a requirement. Even though this metric can be incredibly valuable to the company and its clients, too many businesses are unable to meet such strict demands, and thus tend to treat is a luxury, not a defining characteristic.

Most people, regardless of the industry they are in, are fearful of two prospects. They are change and staying the same. A paradox of sorts, and confusing to management who have developed a growth mindset.

When presented with the idea of a lean operation, rather than the status quo, most team members, and some members of management, recoil from the notion. They are afraid of the change, yet they are quick to point out the flaws in the current workflow. See, this is the paradox.

The term lean thinking was coined by James P. Womack and Daniel T.Jones to capture the essence of their in-depth study of Toyotaʼs fabled Toyota Production System. 

Lean thinking is a new way of thinking any activity and seeing the waste inadvertently generated by the way the process is organized by focusing on the concepts of:

1. Value
2. Value streams
3. Flow
4. Pull
5. Perfection

The complete details can read in

The Essentials of Lean Manufacturing eBook.

Lean thinking was born out of studying the rise of Toyota Motor Company from a bankrupt Japanese automaker in the early 1950s to todayʼs dominant global player. At every stage of its expansion, Toyota remained a puzzle by being capturing new markets with products deemed relatively unattractive and with systematically lower costs while not following any of the usual management dictates. 

"Lean thinking was born out of studying the rise of Toyota Motor Company from a bankrupt Japanese automaker in the early 1950s to todayʼs dominant global player."