Lean is a philosophy with the purpose of increasing value from the customer perspective, through the continuous elimination of waste. During the last decades, the implementation of this philosophy has expanded to the service sector and administrative support processes. The last decades have also shown a major increase of employment within the service sector in Sweden, giving validity to the implementation of lean within administrative support processes. The implementation of this philosophy within the service sector can be associated with the term lean administration. The purpose of this study is to suggest efficiency improvements by applying value stream mapping within the invoice flow of an industrial company's financial unit and to provide recommendations regarding an implementation of lean administration. The purpose of this study is based upon the problems that the financial unit faces today regarding inefficiencies within the invoice flow due to redundant processes and a lack of standardized work. The purpose of this study and research questions are fulfilled by performing a literature study as well as a case study which included qualitative interviews and quantitative observations. The current invoice flow has through the simulation program FlexSim been mapped and analyzed. The authors have been able to construct a recommended invoice flow, with the current flow as a point of reference. The recommended flow shows that a 46% decrease in active process time per invoice can be achieved. This decrease of active process time per invoice alongside an implementation of lean administration can benefit the financial unit in the long term. After interviews, observations and discussions with the case company, the suggested efficiency improvements presented in this study, can be considered applicable within and outside of the observed financial unit. The suggestions for improvement are based on the value stream mapping through FlexSim and could be achieved through an application of the recommended invoice flow. The case company should also consider a future implementation of lean administration and its associated improvement tools 5S, 5-Why and PDCA-cycles.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:UPSALLA1/oai:DiVA.org:hig-36379 |
| Date | January 2021 |
| Creators | Strömqvist, Julian, Karimhadzajeva, Husan |
| Publisher | Högskolan i Gävle, Avdelningen för industriell ekonomi, industridesign och maskinteknik, Högskolan i Gävle, Avdelningen för industriell ekonomi, industridesign och maskinteknik |
| Source Sets | DiVA Archive at Upsalla University |
| Language | Swedish |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Student thesis, info:eu-repo/semantics/bachelorThesis, text |
| Format | application/pdf |
| Rights | info:eu-repo/semantics/openAccess |
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