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On the occasion of International Women's Day on March 8, Planet Lean posted an article on female leadership illustrating how they motivate others to take on the challenge of sustainability through Lean practices. We translated the article for you, which is now available to read on our website.
As I flipped through a multinational company's sustainability report, their commitment to diversity, inclusion and equality stood out. Good job, I thought. However, despite a promising beginning, a few pages down the road I discover that leadership roles are dominated by a single nationality, ethnicity and all-male ensemble.
The report shows intent, but there has been limited follow-up. Curious, I ask the company about it. Their nonchalant answer, accompanied by a shrug, is that tradition outweighs change. I wonder how their intention affects business performance. It turns out that innovation rates are not as fast as they should be and sales are falling. Minorities face barriers to top opportunities and the company denies itself valuable insights. In contrast, their competitors gain momentum because they embrace the benefits that differences bring. Undoubtedly, representation in top management promotes new perspectives on which problems to choose and how to approach them - a capacity that is more crucial now than ever.
FROM THE TOP In the construction and printing sectors, two influential women leaders are demonstrating a new mindset for transformation. By seamlessly integrating Lean and sustainability principles, their companies are thriving and standing out from traditional peers.
Janina Bluma made the transition from high school English teacher and principal to pioneering figure in the international printing industry. As president until 2016 and later as deputy director, Janina championed Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) and environmental stewardship at Livonia. As she approaches her retirement, Janina's impact is embedded in the daily practices that continue to propel the company forward, responsibly.
Juggling business expansion while limiting and reducing the environmental footprint presents a major sustainability challenge for any organization. Livonia is a leading book manufacturer serving more than600 customers in 22 countries and, like others, must manage the environmental impacts associated with significant growth.
"...CSR ensures that the company's economic growth is sustainable and beneficial to all its stakeholders, while minimizing its impact on the environment."
With sales increasing from €1.5 million in 2007 to €95million in 2022, Livonia underwent a remarkable 25-fold expansion of production floor space and strengthened its workforce to nearly 600 employees. Throughout this impressive growth trajectory, the company remained steadfast in prioritizing environmental sustainability. They are on track to make remarkable strides in their sustainability goals by 2025, an achievement Janina argues can only be achieved through Lean-practices and concerted efforts by their staff. Their focus on addressing quality issues, minimizing transportation waste and improving the circularity of materials and productivity has contributed significantly to their progress. These initiatives play a crucial role in the effort to decouple growth from environmental impacts.
Livonia embraces three intertwined principles - Lean, quality and sustainability - to redefine what constitutes a sustainable book. Lean-improvements laid the groundwork for sustainability initiatives. By merging two production facilities in 2021, Livonia streamlined for continuous production and improved flow. Learning from mistakes, they saw them not as failures but as valuable learning moments - enabling Livonia to meet challenges with empowered capacity. Despite previous failed attempts, their internal Lean-influencer, Daiga, persisted, marking the beginning of a successful integration into daily operations, creating a harmonious blend of principles.
Livonia makes books that not only delight customers, but also embrace circularity, extending their lifespan. Lean-principles play a crucial role in traditional waste reduction, and Livonia firmly views waste as an adversary of sustainability. As illustrated in Figure 1, teams and leaders diligently address various forms of waste, including material excess, signatures, waiting time, errors, inadequate training, inappropriate technology, mismatches between demand and production, and energy waste from idle machinery. Their blended approach reduces avoidable waste and increases projects related to planetary conservation.
In 2017, Livonia published their first sustainability report, laying a foundation for improvement. This exercise identified hotspots, areas within their control and those beyond. Through collaborative efforts along the value chain, stakeholders such as publishers, designers and production jointly tackled challenges and brought about systemic changes. Regular meetings proved fruitful, fostered the exchange of ideas and benefited everyone. Expected participation from paper mills in 2024 will expand collaboration to share stories of carbon dioxide reduction and engage in further problem solving between companies. Companies are the company they keep, and Livonia recognizes their responsibility for supplier performance. They have improved procurement practices, supplier audits and performance improvement, resulting in significant emissions reductions across all scopes. Suppliers also visit them and walk the gemba so they can learn and improve together.
Livonia works closely with customers and provides them with factual data. They also inform customers about a broader menu of options, including environmentally friendly choices with potential cost advantages. This has helped to significantly reduce the company's Scope 3 emissions.
"What is good for the environment is not always clear."
Janina recognizes that economic considerations can hinder immediate sustainable decisions, as some options carry higher costs. Livonia consistently works to shift customer perceptions, highlighting the benefits of lower-impact options. For example, one customer required stone paper produced in Malaysia. This comes with higher costs and carbon dioxide emissions. The name of the paper sounded ecological, but there was no need for the specification nor the waste it generated. Livonia provides carbon emissions contributions for each paper type, giving the freedom to choose based on facts, and steering customers toward a more sustainable choice.
Janina notes that people struggle to understand sustainability. To bridge this gap, Livonia hosts workshops foragers and customers, teaching them about minimizing costs and emissions. Through hands-on demonstrations, participants compare two books with different materials and production methods, allowing a visual understanding of life-cycle differences and asking questions about whether desired features are really necessary.
The challenge of the price tag remains a central concern in sustainable transformation, making the Lean-aspect of the trifecta crucial. Kaizen has been cited many times as a driving force for innovation and responsible cost reduction, even in tough times.
"Something has to balance [the costs] - and that's our internal efficiency."
By engaging everyone's creativity on a daily basis, Livonia has gradually improved cost structures through projects aimed at water and energy reduction, better material yields and efficient production, to name a few.
Janina acknowledges the initial struggle to instill belief in these concepts, but notes a positive shift a year after the introduction of the internal Lean-influencer. While top management supports sustainability, the involvement of department managers has been challenging. The most responsive groups have been shift leaders and teams, who benefit directly from improvements, growing voluntary participation. The ongoing challenge lies in engaging department heads, but recent performance, coupled with bonus incentives, shows promising progress, for the benefit of both individuals and teams, as they have been empowered to achieve their goals. What is good for the company and the planet is also good for them.
"The right thing, the right time with the right people."
Nora Freimane, a passionate traveler and lifelong learner, enjoyed a diverse career in the value chain. From business analyst and finance director to roles in customer service and information technology, she developed problem-solving skills across functions. Nora began her journey at Lean while working for Latvia's largest telecommunications company while supporting a family real estate development company that built homes for a niche market. After leaving the corporate world, Nora embraced her entrepreneurial spirit, advising companies and actively participating in the construction business.
Lean Thinking is the cornerstone of Nora and her brother Maris' sustainable approach to construction. Their focus on creating beautiful, sustainable and efficiently built apartments aligns with personal values of responsibility and quality. Design, considered crucial with 75 percent of the cost captured during the design phase, emphasizes sustainability throughintelligent material choices. Choosing durable, eco-friendly materials such as natural windows and flooring demonstrates a commitment to sustainability.
Using technology, they also use3D modeling in design. This innovative approach allows clients to visualize and modify designs without additional cost, rework or material waste. The turnaround time is shorter and the result is much better.
"It's cheaper to change the 3D model than the house!"
Nora and Maris prioritize planet-first decisions over profit-first. They make sure their homes are visually appealing, fit for purpose and manufactured with sustainability in mind. They constantly test their designs by asking whether they themselves would be happy living in the house. Everything they do is rooted in the ethic of being good neighbors - something nature excels at and others can learn from.
Their sustainable practices extend to other areas as well. For example, minimizing pollution in truck transportation through efficient loading. Or minimizing material waste through right-sidedness, which reduces avoidable cuts - something many construction companies overlook. Recycling construction waste also presents challenges. They recycle packaging and reuse excess wood materials for heating, which is especially useful when temperatures in the factory drop to minus 28°C!
Nora explains that achieving sustainable performance goes hand in hand with careful planning. Sufficient time for planning ensures that only necessary items are purchased, in the right sizes, reducing avoidable waste. Nora believes that including waste allowances in planning unintentionally gives permission for wasteful, unsustainable practices. Tighter planning means that unnecessary processes and materials can be trimmed. Construction companies that allow waste face additional complexities, including storage challenges and the need to "store" for residual materials. In the confusion, this can even cause additional purchasing that is not actually needed.
In closing, Nora offers the following valuable advice to those beginning their sustainability journey:
Look broader and think more long-term. Educate yourself. Planning and design are critical to reducing waste, cost and environmental impact. Put more time and effort into the early stages to greatly reduce the effects of products and operations on the planet.
The current situation is that only 28% of C-suite roles are occupied by women, of which 6% are women of color. Moreover, fewer women in leadership positions lead to fewer promotions for women. Despite improvements from decades ago, the numbers still fall short. Research shows that women have strong pro-climate views, and countries with greater gender equality have 12% lower carbon dioxide emissions. Moreover, countries with more women in leadership roles are more likely to support international environmental transfers and exhibit more effective responses to pandemics. Women also excel in essential interpersonal skills, including inspiration, motivation, communication and collaboration, supporting the need for greater representation. As the proportion of women decision-makers increases, global challenges also benefit from their perspectives. Women bring unique viewpoints to problem identification and resolution. This is well worth taking advantage of.
This article specifically highlights women who are making a difference in commemoration of International Women's Day, but it is the perspectives utilized from all genders and groups that enable the wonders of diverse thinking and action. It is encouraging to hear the success stories of Nora and Janina, but they recognize that they are not acting alone. Perhaps their influence, from above, is a key success factor. Throughout history, women have made significant contributions to sustainability, such as Eunice Foote's discovery of global warming and Elinor Ostrom's work to empower communities and local governments to address the climate crisis. More recently, young activists like Greta Thunberg have taken on governments for their negligence. Women shape history and are instrumental in shaping the future. But no woman is an island, and they are probably most successful as part of an inclusive, equal and diverse team.
Creating a problem-solving culture is where Lean Thinking really comes to fruition. To meet the challenge of sustainability, we need everyone, every day, to solve problems that matter. Everyone includes diverse cultures, backgrounds, identities and perspectives. When we embrace this idea, we are more likely to tackle both known and unknown problems, together, giving future generations fewer challenges to grapple with.
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