Lean Management and Leadership towards Achieving Business Excellence in Manufacturing Sector: A Conceptual Framework Development

The purpose of this study is to provide the conceptual understanding on the impact of Lean management and leadership on business excellence. The study will focus on the deployment of Lean management and leadership drive the business excellence in Malaysian Electrical and Electronics (E&E) industry. Based on literature review, the authors have established a linkage that the impact of Leadership is likely contribute positively to the business excellence of the company. Furthermore, the Lean management leads to larger performance improvement. Besides, the authors would like to ascertain the potential of business excellence outcomes are achieve in operational performance, customer and people results. The theoretical framework is guided by Business Excellence Model (BEM) and Leadership theory. The gap in the literature also warrants the need for a contextual study of the Malaysian E&E industry. The limitations from present study suggest a future research may focus on Industry 4.0 companies and also determine what are the leadership traits more conducive to achieve business excellence. Practical adoption of Lean management and leadership may improve infrastructural decision areas of manufacturing strategy such as planning, information, customer, people and process improvements. Therefore, it has implication on activities concerning and business excellence.