Hines, Peter, Tortorella, Guilherme Luz, Antony, Jiju, Romero, David, Walsh, Aidan, Taylor, Darrin, Alves, Anabela Carvalho, Bertolini, Massimo, Caiado, Rodrigo, Demeter, Krisztina, Dinis-Carvalho, José, Ferreira, Luís Pinto, Fettermann, Diego, Filho, Moacir Godinho, Gaiardelli, Paolo, Howe, Graham, Inan, Guven Gurkan, Kumar, Maneesh, Le, Chi Hieu ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-5168-2297, Magnani, Florian, Maqueira, Juan Manuel, Mula, Josefa, Packianather, Michael, Peças, Paulo, Pereira, Maria Teresa Ribeiro, Powell, Daryl, Prashar, Anupama, Rehman, Masood Ur, Vieira De Sá, José Carlos, Saabye, Henrik, Erol, Selim, Teixeira, Leonor and Zak, Helen (2025) A global industrial perspective on Lean Industry 4.0: a qualitative wide-angle lens approach. Production Planning and Control. ISSN 0953-7287 (Print), 1366-5871 (Online) (In Press) (doi:10.1080/09537287.2025.2509143)

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Abstract

This paper provides an insight into the global state of Lean Industry 4.0 (LI4) with over 1,000 industry responses from 66 countries. It looks at 26 different aspects derived from identified gaps in previous research. The approach employs a rigorous qualitative open-response survey undertaken by 33 global researchers and 6 partner organisations. Our findings indicate that there was no unified industry perspective of LI4 terminology. The evolution of I4 is taking a similar path to Lean and making the same mistakes by not focusing on leadership, engagement, competencies, and behaviours. Past academic research has, from an industry perspective, over-emphasised the environment and supply chain. Additionally, the benefits of LI4 application are largely in terms of areas such as efficiency and cost reduction, as well as in terms of learning and engagement. This work contributes to future studies by highlighting research avenues, such as why a piecemeal approach has been taken by industry to LI4, why LI4 has not been more widespread, and more detailed studies around contingent factors such as industry, firm size, or country). It also provides industry with lessons on how to implement LI4 and the mistakes to avoid such as seeing implementation as a purely technical exercise.

Item Type:	Article
Additional Information:	We would like to thank Enterprise Ireland, HKPO, ICBE, Lean Forum, Shingo Institute and UnoPro who contributed with research access and UPV Generalitat Valenciana “Production and Logistics Optimization in Industry 4.0 (i4OPT)” PROMETEO/2021/065 for partial funding.
Uncontrolled Keywords:	Lean Industry 4.0, qualitative survey, global
Subjects:	H Social Sciences > H Social Sciences (General) H Social Sciences > HD Industries. Land use. Labor > HD28 Management. Industrial Management T Technology > T Technology (General)
Faculty / School / Research Centre / Research Group:	Faculty of Engineering & Science Faculty of Engineering & Science > School of Engineering (ENG)
Last Modified:	27 May 2025 15:16
URI:	http://gala.gre.ac.uk/id/eprint/50523

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