Continuous improvement implementation models: a reconciliation and holistic metamodel
Operational excellence and optimization of processes, products, and services have become an important strategy for organizational competitive advantage (Sanchez and Blanco 2014). Operational excellence, defined as‘striving for the best in quality and performance in all operations of the business’ (Hammer 2004, 85), is enabled by and organizations’ ability to harness continuous improvement (CI),‘an organization-wide process of focused and sustained incremental innovation’ (Bessant and Francis 1999, 1106).
Well-known methodologies that enable such continuous improvement in organizations comprise, or are rooted in, amongst others Total Quality Management (TQM), Lean, Six Sigma, and Lean Six Sigma (LSS) (Shah and Ward 2003; Schroeder et al. 2008).
Today, these methodologies have been implemented in many organizations, operating in many different industries. Despite its wide application, CI implementation success rates vary strongly (Antony, Lizarelli, and Fernandes 2020; Chakravorty 2009; Kumar et al. 2008). Moreover, after several decades of research, evidence on causes for (un)successful CI implementation remains scarce and anecdotal in nature (Chakravorty 2009; Kumar, Antony, and Tiwari 2011; Hilton and Sohal 2012; Bhamu and Singh Sangwan 2014).
