Track: Business Management

Abstract

During recent years, sustainability has been a relevant topic of common interest for organizations due to several factors. Likewise, continuous improvement is essential for the competitiveness of any company and the Lean Manufacturing philosophy is a fundamental pillar to fulfill this purpose. The objective of this research was to identify the contribution that Lean Manufacturing tools can make to sustainability. To do this, it began with a description of the background, history, and pillars of sustainability. Then, the foundation of the main Lean Manufacturing tools was explained, to finally relate the contribution of these tools to the seven sustainability principles included in the ISO 26000 standard. The results obtained showed that several tools contribute to all the sustainability principles, while others only do so indirectly, the contributions identified were economic, social and/or environmental in nature. Thus, companies could initiate sustainability initiatives from the basic and early stages of production without having to resort to complex or specialized management systems