Critical factors for lean and innovation in services: from a systematic review to an empirical investigation

Abstract

This paper aims to investigate the synergy between the innovation and lean philosophy in the services context. The research is composed of a systematic literature review (SLR) on critical success factors (CSFs) related to innovation and lean initiatives applied to services. From this extensive review, 16 common CSF were identified. This analysis is limited to peer review articles from Scopus, ISI Web of Science and SciELO databases. Then, a survey was applied to evaluate the perception of professionals working in services, on the relevance of these factors in the context of innovation and lean initiatives in services. The results show that there is synergy between the CSFs of innovation in services and CSFs of lean initiatives. The selected factors cover organisational aspects, people management, processes and customer. This paper offers interesting implications for managers, pointing out which factors should be prioritised for synergies between lean and innovation, thus achieving more competitive advantage and the success of the organisation. Therefore, it is the first SLR on synergies between CSFs for innovation and CSFs of lean philosophy applied to services; it also provides practical analyses of the current state of these synergisms by the perception of professionals who work in services.