Creating a development force in Swedish healthcare: A focus on the first-line managers’ perspective when applying Lean

Abstract

Purpose

The purpose of this paper is to present the results from a study that investigates first-line healthcare managers’ views on their role and the conditions that influence their ability to drive improvement work based on Lean.

Design/methodology/approach

A questionnaire was sent to all first-line managers in a healthcare organization to investigate their views on their role, conditions and ability to create change according to Lean. The results from four of the questions are presented, which focus on how crucial they consider their role to be for managing improvement work based on Lean, what work tasks their time is spent on, what factors they consider to be important to their ability to drive change and what factors best describe what Lean provides.

Findings

The results show that first-line managers claim that their role is crucial in improvement work, but when they defined their work tasks, the time spent on improvements was not frequently described. Time, support from coworkers, and a clear vision and clear goals were the three factors that they considered to be most important to their ability to drive improvement work. Considering their leadership, Lean contributed to the structure with tools and supportive methods.

Originality/value

The questions can be used separately or as part of the entire questionnaire before and along a Lean process to obtain a better understanding of how to create a sustainable Lean approach in healthcare. Understanding the factors that first-line managers consider supporting their ability in improvement work and what they consider Lean provides is important in creating a development force in Swedish healthcare.

Citation

Kahm, T. and Ingelsson, P. (2019), "Creating a development force in Swedish healthcare: A focus on the first-line managers’ perspective when applying Lean", International Journal of Health Care Quality Assurance, Vol. 32 No. 8, pp. 1132-1144. https://doi.org/10.1108/IJHCQA-01-2019-0017