Search results

The paper provides a step-by-step guide in the guise of a roadmap for service improvement initiatives using importance performance map analysis (IPMA).

To empirically illustrate how IPMA can be applied to any service industry, three sectors are considered; sports and fitness (study A), hospitality (study B) and higher education (study C). Following the proper selection of measuring instruments and their evaluation using structural equation modeling-partial least squares (Smart-PLS), IPMA is applied to identify those attributes having strong total effects (high importance) over the targeted construct (satisfaction) but which also have low average latent variable scores (low performance).

For sports and fitness (study A), the physical aspects and programme quality require managerial attention. For the hospitability sector (study B), it is service commitment, interaction quality and internal sense of happiness. Whereas for higher education (study C), it is administrative quality as well as the element of transformative quality, namely the university’s role in adding to its students’ emotional stability, which needs the attention of the top management.

This study provides researchers and practitioners with a roadmap for applying PLS-SEM and IPMA for continuous service quality improvement. The roadmap extends upon Ringle and Sarstedt’s (2016) work. It highlights critical decisions that need to be considered in the pre-analytical stages of the IPMA application, i.e. at the research design phase in selecting the most appropriate service quality measurement model specifications. It not only contributes to the existing body of knowledge by providing empirical evidence to advance theory development in the quality management field but also has implications for the practitioners in any service sector on where to focus their attention for an effective service improvement.

The purpose of this study is to carry out a comprehensive systematic review of lean implementation frameworks and roadmaps developed over the past decade and report the key findings along with the limitations and the way forward.

A systematic review methodology proposed by Tranfield (2003), was followed to identify the relevant works on the research topic. Articles were searched using a set of inclusion criteria in various databases including Google Scholar, Web of Science and Science Direct over a period of 30 years.

The high failure rate of lean system implementation, reaching a range between 70 and 90% in almost all industries, is a matter of concern. This failure rate is still high even though numerous frameworks and roadmap models exist to streamline lean implementation. There is no standard framework or roadmap identified in the literature and many organisations are implementing lean in their unique ways. However, it would be desirable to develop a practical and systematic roadmap on lean-looking into the cultural and leadership dimensions rather than focusing on a set of tools. Moreover, most frameworks and roadmaps lack the sustenance aspects of lean implementation.

This research only identifies the fundamental gaps with the existing frameworks and roadmaps on lean implementation. The next phase of the research is to develop a roadmap and validate it with a number of organisations in different cultural contexts and leadership styles.

The authors argue that this is one of the most comprehensive systematic review on lean frameworks and roadmaps, ever produced in the literature to date.