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This paper seeks to advance the understanding of the complementarity between action learning and lean. Today, this is an underexplored research area, despite the high degree of similarities and syngeneic possibilities between these two research streams. The paper describes an action learning intervention at VELUX, a Danish rooftop manufacturer designed to develop its leaders as lean learning facilitators to cope with the increasing velocity of change stemming from growth, sustainability, and digitalisation agendas. The paper locates the complementary between action learning and lean in the extant literature and presents an account of practice from VELUX for extrapolating five promoting factors for developing leaders as lean learning facilitators. The paper concludes that lean complements action learning with a suite of concepts, systems, practices, and methods for institutionalising ongoing action learning and concepts on how to think and act as a leader to foster a lean learning system consisting of empowered and proficient problem-solvers. Furthermore, action learning complements lean with the underlying learning mechanisms of facilitating and sustaining the change towards instituting leaders as lean learning facilitators and adopting a lean learning system.

This paper sets out to investigate the microfoundations of lean leadership. To do so, we explore the Japanese philosophical concepts of Monozukuri, Hitozukuri, and Kotozukuri, representing that passion and craftsmanship for making things, developing people, and making things happen. The paper delves into how to foster lean leadership as a pivotal success factor in adopting lean thinking and practices in a manufacturing firm. By addressing the research gap concerning leadership traits contributing to successful lean deployment, the study explores the microfoundations of lean leadership. The paper is based on a single, in-depth longitudinal case study that offers new insights into the microfoundations underpinning lean leadership at VELUX, a Danish rooftop window manufacturer. The research contributes valuable evidence to the existing lean leadership research discourse, where lean should be seen as a human learning system, illustrating how lean leaders can cultivate lean and how the Japanese philosophical concepts of Monozukuri, Hitozukuri, and Kotozukuri resonate in a Western context. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to examine the digitalization of operational processes and activities in lean manufacturing firms and explore the associated learning implications through the lens of cumulative capability theory. Design/methodology/approach: Adopting a multiple-case design, we examine four cases of digitalization initiatives within lean manufacturing firms. We collected data through semi-structured interviews and direct observations during site visits. Findings: The study uncovers the development of learning capabilities as a result of integrating lean and digitalization. We find that digitalization in lean manufacturing firms contributes to the development of both routinized and evolutionary learning capabilities in a cumulative fashion. Originality/value: The study adds nuance to the limited theoretical understanding of the integration of lean and digitalization by showing how it cumulatively develops the learning capabilities of lean manufacturing firms. As such, the study supports the robustness of cumulative capability theory. We further contribute to research by offering empirical support for the cumulative nature of learning. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]