Precipitated by events in the financial sector in 2007, and fueled by the bursting of the U.S. and European housing markets, the global economy fell quickly into the ‘Great Recession,’ considered by the IMF (2009) as the worst global economic decline since World War II. Today, while the worst of the crisis may have passed, certain effects linger, particularly in regard to organizations’ significantly reduced access to capital and credit (Bolger, 2015). Not surprisingly, Lean Management and other non-capital intensive approaches to improving efficiency, eliminating waste and enhancing customer value, are enjoying a resurgence (Bhamu & Sangwan, 2014; Samuel, Found, & Williams, 2015). To illustrate, executive search firm Avery Point Group reported that the number of lean job postings in 2013 had more than doubled since the beginnings of the post-crisis recovery. Expanding beyond manufacturing, Lean Management is also being increasingly adopted by service and public sector organizations (Bhamu & Sangwan, 2014; Cox & Chicksand, 2005; Piercy & Rich, 2009) that face the similar challenge of ‘doing more with less.’ As for academic research, Bhamu and Sangwan (2014), in their review of the academic research from 75 international journals and eight conferences, document a marked uptick in lean publications beginning in 2009. Moyano-Fuentes and Sacristan-Diaz (2012) have classified the lean literature into four categories: shop floor, value chain, work organization, and geography. Papadopoulou and Ozbayrak (2005) € provide a six-part categorization: production floor management; product/process-oriented; production planning,scheduling, and control; lean implementation; work-force management; and supply chain management.

Following Szabo et al. (2001, p. 225), we define leader ‘behaviors’ as specific observable verbal and nonverbal actions of managers “in interaction with their followers in an organizational setting.” Similar to Schwartz (1999), ‘values’ are defined as desirable notions a person carries with him/her at all times as a guide for his/her behavior. While our intent is to explicate values and behaviors, we do not focus on the potential linkages between the two. Arguably, numerous situational factors will mediate or moderate this values-behaviors relationship, e.g. one’s intentions, choices, attitudes, and emotions (Connor & Becker, 1994; Szabo et al., 2001). Yet, compared to the more situationally-determined factors, values tend to have a relatively stable influence on behavior (Jin & Rounds, 2012). The propositions in the Discussion section provide direction for follow-up studies to more fully understand the connections between lean values and behaviors.

What we find conspicuously absent from these categorizations of research, however, and despite its importance, is a category focused specifically on leadership. For Liker and Convis (2012, p. xiii), “the biggest gap in capabilities in the lean movement, and the root cause of failure on many lean programs, is in leadership.” Organizational psychologist and lean expert David Mann refers to leadership as “the missing link” in lean practice and research: “implementing [lean] tools represents at most 20 percent of the effort in Lean transformations. The other 80 percent of the effort is expended on changing leaders’ practices and behaviors, and ultimately their mindset” (Mann, 2009, p. 15). The purpose of this exploratory research, therefore, is to know more about the leaders of lean initiatives. More specifically, and as called for by Glynn and Raffaelli (2010) and Lakshman (2006), we will undertake systematic research into the work behaviors of lean leaders, and the underlying work values on which those behaviors are believed to depend (Bardi & Schwartz, 2003; Connor & Becker, 1994; Deichmann & Stam, 2015; Denison, 1996; Fu, Tsui, Liu, & Li, 2010; Jonsen, Galunic, Weeks, & Braga, 2015; Lakshman, 2006; Lord & Brown, 2001; Schein, 2004; Schwartz et al., 2012; Szabo, Reber, Weibler, Brodbeck, & Wunderer, 2001; Yukl, 2012).