Lean Management in the Swedish Public Sector: How is value and customer in a Public Service Organization with multiple stakeholders defined, and how does it affect improvement work?

Abstract: Background - Different scholars such as Radnor & Johnston (2013), explains that it is not until The Public Service Organizations are able to confidently define their customers and their customers' value, that they are able to link their internal efficiencies with their external effectiveness and thus create a sustainable and long-term success of their Lean initiative. Purpose - In order to close the found theoretical gap, the purpose of this paper is to answer our chosen research question; "How is value and customer in a Public Service Organization with multiple stakeholders defined, and how does it affect improvement work?" Methodology - This Master thesis is an exploratory investigation of the concept Lean Management within the Swedish Public Sector. This research is performed through a study of four cases in two Swedish Public Service Organizations, namely the Immigrations Office and the Social Insurance Agency, through interviews and complementing company data. Findings - With subsequent analyzes and empirical data in mind we came to the following conclusions: Firstly, a broad perspective is common in Swedish Public Service Organizations, which is key to identify all stakeholders values. Secondly, an end-to-end perspective helps address and deal with conflicting values from different stakeholders. The end-to-end perspective is in our research more common when a full implementation of Lean is used. Finally, we found it more appropriate to begin with focusing on the customer and avoid "low-hanging-fruits" in the beginning, which is visualized in a model developed from the "Lean Self-Sustaining Improvement Model" by Radnor & Johnston (2013).