Spending $40 million on consultants an odd way to save money

Claims that the Lean methodology produces savings have also been called into question. For example one Lean “success” at the Children's Hospital of Saskatchewan cost $30 million more than the original estimate.

Ottawa (18 Mar. 2014) — To implement its “Lean” program for health care, the Saskatchewan government is spending $40 million on consultants from the United States. This includes $3,500 a day for “Japanese sensei.” And this $40 million doesn't include the cost of staff time for employees to attend training sessions.

Lean programs considered "management by stress" and used to justify layoffs while increasing workloads of remaining staff

In other places where Lean and alternate “new management” schemes have been tried, they have been criticized as being “management by stress.” Lean depends on standardizing tasks, and in many health care settings, where workers are responding to a wide range of situations, that isn't possible. Instead, Lean is used to justify layoffs, while the remaining workers see their workload increase.

There are already concerns that this may happen in Saskatchewan.

Money being wasted on U.S. consultants while Saskatchewan cuts jobs at home

At the same time as the provincial government is spending $40 million on American consultants, Statistics Canada is reporting that the number of health and social services jobs in Saskatchewan have been reduced by 1,400 over the last year.

Claims that Lean management produces savings have also been called into question. For exmaple, one Lean “success” at the Children's Hospital of Saskatchewan cost $30 million more than the original estimate.

NUPGE

The National Union of Public and General Employees (NUPGE) is one of Canada's largest labour organizations with over 340,000 members. Our mission is to improve the lives of working families and to build a stronger Canada by ensuring our common wealth is used for the common good. NUPGE