Accepted Manuscript

Impact of Lean and Sustainability oriented innovation on Sustainability

performance of Small and Medium Sized Enterprises: A Data Envelopment
Analysis-based Framework

Debashree De, Soumyadeb Chowdhury, Prasanta Kumar Dey, Sadhan Kumar Ghosh

PII: S0925-5273(18)30268-8

DOI: 10.1016/j.ijpe.2018.07.003

Reference: PROECO 7087

To appear in: International Journal of Production Economics

Received Date: 03 August 2017

Accepted Date: 03 July 2018

Please cite this article as: Debashree De, Soumyadeb Chowdhury, Prasanta Kumar Dey, Sadhan
Kumar Ghosh, Impact of Lean and Sustainability oriented innovation on Sustainability performance
of Small and Medium Sized Enterprises: A Data Envelopment Analysis-based Framework,
International Journal of Production Economics (2018), doi: 10.1016/j.ijpe.2018.07.003

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 ACCEPTED MANUSCRIPT

Impact of Lean and Innovation on Sustainability Performance of

Small and Medium Sized Enterprises: A Data Envelopment Analysis-based
Framework

Debashree De1, Soumyadeb Chowdhury2, Prasanta Kumar Dey3, Sadhan Kumar Ghosh4

1,2,3. Aston Business School, Aston University, Birmingham B4 7ET, United Kingdom
[email protected] 2 [email protected] 3 [email protected]
4. Jadavpur University, Mechanical Department, India e-mail: [email protected]
 ACCEPTED MANUSCRIPT

Impact of Lean and Sustainability oriented innovation on Sustainability performance of

Small and Medium Sized Enterprises: A Data Envelopment Analysis-based Framework

Abstract:
Lean and Sustainability Oriented Innovation both enhance competitiveness of small and
medium enterprises (SMEs) in a sustainable way. Lean is efficiency focused, whereas
sustainability oriented innovation emphasizes on responsiveness. Although lean and
sustainability oriented innovation have been separately researched, there is a gap in knowledge
on the combined effect of lean and sustainability oriented innovation (SOI) on SMEs supply
chain sustainability. SMEs have limited resources and face numerous competition. Therefore,
their supply chain sustainability can only be achieved through most appropriate trade-off
between economic, environment and social aspects of business. The purpose of this paper is to
understand the combined effect of sustainability oriented innovation and lean practices, on
supply chain sustainability performance of SMEs. The study uses a Data Envelopment
Analysis (DEA) based framework and applies this to a group of SMEs within the Eastern part
of India. Lean and sustainability oriented innovation are considered as input criteria, and
economic, operational, environmental and social aspects are considered as output criteria of
the proposed framework. DEA segregates inefficient SMEs and suggests at least a SME to
benchmark. Subsequently, the study undertakes qualitative approach to suggest improvement
measures for the inefficient SMEs. The results reveal that combined lean and SOI helps achieve
SMEs’ supply chain sustainability. The findings are useful for policy makers and Individual
SMEs’ owners and managers to undertake measures for improving sustainability. Theoretically
this research contributes a DEA-based framework to study the effect of combined lean and SOI
on sustainability that helps improving SMEs’ sustainability performance.
Keywords Small and Medium Enterprises, Supply chain sustainability, Sustainability-
Oriented Innovation , Data Envelopment Analysis
Paper type Research Paper

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1. Introduction:

Small and medium sized enterprises (SMEs) make up around 90% of the world’s businesses
(Head, ISO) and employ 50-60% of the world’s population (Organisation for Economic Co-
operation and Development Staff, 2000). SMEs in the Indian manufacturing sector, contribute
significantly to Indian gross domestic product (GDP). While it is widely accepted that SMEs
play a significant role in the economic development of any country, they also exert considerable
pressure on the environment, not individually, but collectively (Speier, Mollenkopf, & Stank,
2008). It has been estimated that SMEs contribute up to 70 percent of global pollution
collectively (Hillary, 2000). Available research data suggests that SMEs are responsible for
more than 50% of the industrial pollution in the Asia-Pacific region and there are numerous
examples which suggest that SMEs contribute significantly to environmental damage and GHG
emissions (Whitehead, 2013). Additionally, recent survey reveals that SMEs consume more
than 13% of total global energy demand (around 74 exajoules (EJ)). Cost-effective energy
efficiency measures could shave off as much as 30% of their consumption, namely 22 EJ,
which is more energy than Japan and Korea combined consume per year (IEA 2015).

Indian manufacturing SMEs contribute to 45% of India’s manufacturing output and 17% of
India’s GDP. It gives employment to approx. 40% of India’s workforce (Dubal, 2016). A
major concern of any business firm (small or large) is to remain sustainable throughout the
products/services life cycle. Sustainability in SMEs could be achieved through most
appropriate trade-off among economic, environment and social pillars (Tajbakhsh & Hassini,
2015, Piercy and Rich, 2015; Ogunbiyi et al., 2014; Miller et al., 2010). SMEs businesses are
challenging from both demand and supply sides. On the demand side, on one hand, the original
equipment manufacturers are very demanding and on the other hand, the number of competitors
is numerous. In the supply side, adhering to various regulations and managing procurement are
also very challenging. Therefore, SMEs tend to be more economic focused without showing
much concern to environmental and social aspects for survival unless environmental and social
measures provide higher cost savings. Studies have also revealed that SMEs’ environmental
and social practices are driven by the customers’ needs and governmental regulations.

Sustainability has become an imperative responsibility for enterprises to survive in the current
society due to the threats created by traditional manufacturing practices, and regulations
imposed by stakeholders and policymakers. There has been growing pressure on the SMEs
stemming from adverse global economic and climatic conditions, to integrate various supply
chain paradigms (such as lean, innovation) for meeting the demands of the customer efficiently
and effectively, while adhering to the environmental and social requirements. This has
motivated both SMEs and researchers to identify different approaches for implementing
sustainable operations that will lead to competitiveness. SMEs need a framework allowing
them to identify and implement their sustainability development scheme requested, not only
by the stakeholders, but also by individual SMEs of the supply chain systems (Hsu, Chang, &
Luo, 2017). In view of the above, to achieve sustainability SMEs need to consider economic,
environmental and social aspects across their entire supply chain.

Lean refers to continuous improvement and improves quality and productivity by taking cost
and waste out of all operations (Machado & Leitner, 2010). Innovation refers to the
commercialization of newly designed and implemented products or processes (Van de Ven,
1986). Lean and innovation are two driving forces of today’s business success. Lean approach
is efficiency focused and innovation has responsiveness priority that emphasizes on customers’
satisfaction. Sustainability Oriented Innovation(SOI) is defined as the steps taken in process of

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integration of the social, economic and environmental approach of the product, process and
organisation (Klewitz et al., 2014).Although the impact of lean approach and SOI (Williamson
et al., 2004; Tan et al., 2015; Lii and Kuo, 2016; Jabbour et al., 2015) on sustainability have
been separately researched, there is huge knowledge gap on combinative effect of lean and
sustainability oriented innovation on SMEs supply chain sustainability. Supply chain
sustainability can be achieved through most suitable trade-off between economic,
environmental and social aspects of business. However, with fundamentally different concepts,
some aspects of lean may negatively affect a company’s capability to be successful with certain
types of innovations (Chen & Taylor, 2009). Similarly, certainly type of innovation may not
be cost effective but could contribute to better environmental and social performance.
Therefore, the combined impact of lean and sustainability-oriented innovation on sustainability
performance of SMEs’ supply chain is important to achieve competitiveness. The overarching
aim of this paper is to facilitate SMEs to achieve sustainability but specifically intends to reveal
the combined effect of lean and SOI on sustainability performance.

The rest of the paper is organised as follows. In Section 2, we critically analyse contemporary
research on impact of lean and sustainability-oriented innovation on sustainability and identify
research gaps. In Section 3, we state the methodology of this research. Section 4, we define the
DEA measurement model and in section 5 we demonstrate the DEA application framework
supplemented with the results. Section 6 covers the research discussion, followed by the
conclusion in section 7.

2 Literature review
The literature review has been classified into following sections:
2.1 SMEs Supply Chain Sustainability
According to Seuring (2008) sustainable supply chain management is defined as the
management of material, information and capital flows as well as cooperation among
companies along the supply chain while taking goals from all three dimensions of sustainable
development, i.e., economic, environmental and social, into account which are derived from
customer and stakeholder requirements. The SMEs are a critical part of the supply chain of the
bigger companies (Seuring & Müller, 2008). A bigger organisation transfers the pressure of
sustainability on to its suppliers who are majorly SMEs, thus sharing both risk and
responsibility (Dey & Cheffi, 2013). Sustainability triple bottom line framework has major
focus on the economy, environment and social aspects of the organisation (Elkington, 1997).
The operational and economic aspects of the SMEs are the essential targets to produce goods
and to gain revenue. However environmental and social performance, as well as their economic
efficiency tend to conflict in their nature of contribution of sustainability (Tajbakhsh & Hassini,
2015).
It is believed that the environmental damage caused by SMEs will grow unless innovative
strategies are devised. There are, however, a number of barriers that prevent SMEs from
achieving such innovative strategies and these include: a lack of information on the cost-
benefits of improving environmental performance, weak external pressure / incentives, lack of
internal capacity (e.g. financial resources, human resources, technologies, business processes
and R&D activities), weak supporting frameworks and in many cases political indulgence by
policy makers (Zhu & Sarkis, 2004; Dey & Cheffi, 2013). Hence SMEs struggle in achieving
Supply chain sustainability.

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2.2 Lean practices

The concept of lean has evolved from the Japanese manufacturer, Toyota Motor Corporation,
focusing primarily on the reduction of waste in operations (Herron and Hicks, 2008; Ōno,
1988). In the existing operations management literature, the definition of lean practices
provides different perspectives to accomplish lean. For example, lean enables the businesses
to engage with an efficient value creation process. Additionally, lean is linked to productivity,
and customer satisfaction, which will eventually lead to improvement in quality, speed of the
process and reduction in cost. In summary, the existing studies looking at integrating lean and
sustainability have often limited the lean philosophy to reducing waste at operational level (e.g.
Lapinski et al., 2006; Green et al., 2010; Cabral et al., 2012; Miller and Sarder, 2012) or quality
management (Zhu and Sarkis, 2004). In this context, consolidating the lean literature, Piercy
and Rich (2014) have identified two levels of lean operations, i.e. adopting them in the
workplace primarily focusing on the operational improvements, and in devising business
strategy to address environmental and community concerns.
2.3 Lean practices and sustainability
Piercy and Brammer (2012) identified lean principle help to improve the overall sustainability
with the six dimensions: Workplace - Improve working conditions through higher level of
safety, training and incentives (Taubitz, 2010), Environment - Optimal usage of resources to
reduce waste and environmental impact (Piercy and Brammer, 2012), Quality - Lean
operations aim to improve the quality of product and services provided to clients (Womack and
Jones, 2005), Supply chain - Developing long-term relationship with suppliers to reduce costs,
wastage and improve quality is fundamental to lean management (Lamming, 1993), (Simpson
and Power, 2005), Governance and Ethics - Transparency of information corresponding to the
management practices is a core driver of lean management (Lamming, 1993), Community -
Maintaining a positive reputation is a core principle of lean management (Womack and Jones,
2005).
2.4 Sustainability Oriented Innovation (SOI)

Sustainability oriented innovation refers to the direction which requires management of the
economic, social and ecological aspects (Klewitz et al.,2014) so that they can become
integrated into design of new products, process and organization structure (Rennings,2000).
SOI primarily consists of product innovation, process innovation and organization innovation
primarily focusing on the improvement of the sustainability of the organization (Klewitz et
al.,2014; Altenburg et al.,2012). SMEs innovate differently than traditional innovation. Process
Innovation refers to the solutions adopted to improve the process goods and services (Adams,
2016). It aims to improving the eco-efficiency of the company. The major focus is on cleaner
production. Organisation Innovation refers to the reorganization of the routines and structures
within firms to focus people and organization. It includes formalized management system such
as the environmental systems. Implementing Environmental Management System (EMS)
including ISO 14000 is a typical example of organisational innovation for environmental
sustainability (Wu 2017).

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2.4 Lean practices and Sustainability Oriented Innovation (SOI) on SMEs Supply chain
sustainability
Lean process focus primarily to reduce costs and sustainability oriented innovations focuses to
create new business value by transforming original ideas to process or services that satisfy
customers’ certain needs, and thus enlarge the market size and strengthen a company’s overall
competitiveness (Chen & Taylor, 2009). However, the existing literature integrating lean to
sustainability have primarily focused on the philosophy of reducing waste to deliver
environmental benefits. The lean, supply chain and sustainability has been critically reviewed
(Martínez-Jurado & Moyano-Fuentes, 2014). Lean Management Practice has been extended to
SMEs’ supply chain through eliminating waste, enhancing quality, reducing costs and
increasing flexibility across supply chain in different tiers (Inman and Green 2018).
However, with fundamentally different concepts, some aspects of lean may negatively affect a
company’s capability to be successful with certain types of innovations (Chen & Taylor, 2009).
Piercy et al. (2015) suggest innovation orientation is required for adopting lean. Lean practices
result in an overall decrease in organizations’ innovativeness (Lewis, 2000). Lean approach is
efficiency focused, and sustainability is the most appropriate trade-off among economic,
environmental and social practices (Piercy & Rich, 2015). Studies have highlighted lean
adoption leads to sustainability (Moreira et al. ,2010). Achieving sustainable business
performance requires sustainability-oriented innovation, which is different from traditional
innovation.

The existing research have tried to develop the relationship between lean practices (Inman and
Green,2018) and sustainability-oriented innovation (Klewitz et al.,2014; Adams, 2016)
separately with sustainability. For improving sustainability, the lean practices are required
(Inman and Green,2018). Lean approach is efficiency focused and innovation has
responsiveness priority that emphasizes on customers’ satisfaction. There is a research gap on
the study of combined impact of lean and sustainability-oriented innovation on supply chain
sustainability of SMEs. The research aims to bridge the gap by studying the combined impact
of sustainability-oriented innovation and lean practices on the SMEs supply chain
sustainability.

2.3 Supply chain sustainability and relevant methods:

Supply chain sustainability can be achieved through a trade-off between the efficiency and
responsiveness dimensions across the supply chain drivers (e.g., facilities, transportation,
inventory, information, sourcing and pricing), through consideration of environmental and
social criteria, along with customers’ requirements, when making decisions in strategic,
planning and operational levels. Although lean approach and sustainability oriented innovation
(Williamson et al., 2004; Tan et al., 2015; Lii and Kuo, 2016; Jabbour et al., 2015) have been
separately researched, there is a gap on combined effect of sustainability oriented innovation
and lean on SMEs supply chain sustainability. Understanding the combined impact of lean and
sustainability oriented innovation to achieve sustainability helps SMEs to decide means for
improving sustainability performance through adopting most appropriate combined SOI and
lean approach. Therefore, there is a need to study the impact of lean and SOI on SMEs supply
chain sustainability.

The supply chain characteristics of SMEs vary from that of the large organisations. Large
organisation supply chain performance measures are decided by perfect delivery, order fill rate,

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inventory turnover etc. while that of SMEs are more focused on the internal failures, inventory
costs, customer services, productivity etc. (Thakkar,2007). SMEs supply chain face frequent
changes in their order and has comparative shorter lead time. SMEs have more flexibility in
their process which poses as their advantage over the large organisation. As SMEs have distinct
supply chain characteristics, the conventional large organisation supply chain performance
measurement model cannot be used for SMEs sustainable supply chain measurement. The
existing literature have used lifecycle assessment, equilibrium models, statistical sampling,
case study and action research for large companies’ sustainable supply chain measurement
(Taticchi et al.,2015). In the existing methods however, the distinct SMEs’ characteristics and
Critical Success Factor could not be measured and improved. Thus, from above argument, there
is a need for an innovative SMEs supply chain sustainability framework which will help SMEs
in measuring and improving the sustainability of SMEs’ supply chain.
There are many analytical models and the indices present to measure performance of
sustainable supply chain of organisations (Tajbakhsh & Hassini, 2015). Generally critical
Indicators are derived to measure the supply chain performance of the organisation. The
traditional method of measuring the supply chain efficiency is “spider”, ”radar” or “z” chart
(Wong, 2007). The technique is graphical based so it leads to inconvenience in multiple input
and output. Another method is of ratio but it is difficult to capture all the set of ratios into one
judgement (Shen, 2013). Supply chain characteristics requires a multiple factors performance
measurement model. Multi criteria decision making (MCDM) approaches (e.g. the Analytic
Hierarchy Process, the Analytic Network Process, Fuzzy theory etc.) have been used for
evaluating the performance of the supply chain (Bhattacharya et al., 2014) but the method
neither be used for assessing the large number of organisations nor for an individual
organisation. Balanced Score Card and the supply chain operations reference (SCOR) model
have been used to measure the efficiency of the supply chain (Brewer, 2000). However,
availability of accurate quantitative data on SMEs’ performance is challenging (Shepherd &
Günter, 2010). Table shows the comparative analysis of the methods used in Supply Chain
Sustainability. The existing analytical methods also require to quantify individual constructs
and the Critical Success Factor for the performance measurement of sustainable supply chain.
Hence there is a knowledge gap in how to measure the sustainable SMEs supply chain and
suggest improvement solutions. Moreover, this research intends to reveal the impact of lean
and sustainability-oriented innovation on sustainability so as to suggest enhancing
sustainability performance through combined lean and sustainability oriented innovation.
According to the authors’ knowledge, there is no work that has measured relationship of lean
and sustainability-oriented innovation with sustainability performance objectively. Table 1
shows the comparative analysis between the methods used for Supply Chain Sustainability

Table 1 Comparative analysis of the methods used for Supply Chain Sustainability
S.No Methods to measure the supply chain sustainability of SMEs
Method Application Negative Citation
1 Multi criteria GSCM, Sustainable It cannot be used Gunasekaran and Kobu
decision making supply chain for analysis of (2007),
more than a Schaltegger and Burritt,
certain number (2014).
of case studies Dey and Cheffi (2013)
Singh et al., (2007),
Bhattacharya et al.,
(2014)

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2 Supply Chain Uses performance Cannot be used Taticchi et al.,(2012);

Operation metrics to evaluate for large sample Bai and Sarkis (2014)
Reference(SCOR)
3 Balanced Score Organisation Lack to integrate Reefke and
Card(BSC) performance from all sustainability Trocchi(2013),Kaplan
financial perspective dimension and and Norton (1992),
supply chain Tseng et al.(2015)
members
4 Life cycle Environmental supply Does not include Seuring(2013);
assessment chain design, carbon all aspects, the Croesand Vermeulen
footprint performance social standards (2015); Matos and Hall
evaluation, evaluating missing (2007); Simao et al.
environment (2016); Park et al. (2016)
performance
5 Fuzzy set Sustainability Cannot be used Erol et al. (2011)
approaches performance of Supply for large sample
chain
6 DEA Multi-level DEA used Can be used for Tajbakhsh and Hassini
for analysis the Improvement of (2015);
efficiency sustainability Mirhedayatian et al.
between and among the (2014)
units
7 International ISO 14001 used as the Not much Vermeulen and
standards and proof of environmental relevant to Metselaar (2015)
composite performance of the SMES as SMEs
indicators supplier selection have unique
characteristics
than that of large
organisations
8 Conceptual Initial model which can Case specific Azevedo et al., (2012);
framework be used for Goyalet et al., (2018);
sustainability Lee and Wu, (2014);
assessment of a Santiteerakul et al.,(
company 2015);
Shokraviand Kurnia,
(2014);Sloan (2010)
Varsei et al., (2014)

Data envelopment analysis(DEA):

Data Envelopment Analysis (DEA) developed systematically by Charnes (1978), is a non-
parametric technique to evaluate the relative efficiencies of a set of comparable decision
making units (DMUs) by mathematical programming. DEA is a linear programming technique
that provides dynamic collective comparative results for evaluating the productivity of
organizations based on multiple inputs and outputs (Muhammet, 2014). The idea is to make a
comprehensive supply chain performance measurement system that can capture the total supply
chain performance. Using the capabilities of DEA to assess sustainable supply chains
performance (Cooper, Seiford, & Zhu, 2011). In DEA the input output model is to be designed
such that the ratio of weights does not ask for the exact weight of each criteria. Taticchi et al.,
(2015) developed the performance measurement for the sustainable supply chain for the big
companies. DEA has been used to measure the sustainability of the supply chain networks for
big companies (Tajbakhsh & Hassini, 2015).

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DEA has been used in recent literature to study the sustainability (regional, national and supply
chain issues). In initial studies DEA is used to focus on environment sustainability considering
only economic and environment dimensions (Zhou et al., 2018). Existing DEA models have
used the secondary data to analyse the sustainability by traditional DEA BCC (DEA model by
Introduced by Banker, Chames and Cooper (1984)), model. This study aims to reveal impact
of lean and sustainability oriented innovation practices on sustainability performance of SMEs’
supply chain and calls for developing a framework for SMEs’ sustainable supply chain
performance measurement considering lean and sustainability oriented innovation practices as
input criteria and sustainability performance i.e. economic, environmental and social as output
criteria. Due to the nature of the criteria this study uses the perceptions of the stakeholders of
the case study companies in order to quantify the inputs and outputs of the DEA model. DEA
model helps segregate efficient and inefficient SMEs on the basis of right combination of lean
and sustainability oriented innovation practices vis a vis sustainability performance. The
inefficient companies are allowed to benchmark their performance with their peers to derive
improvement measures with respect to lean and sustainability oriented innovation practices
that need to be fixed. According to authors’ knowledge, there is no research that uses DEA to
measure efficiency with respect to adopting right combination of lean and sustainability
oriented innovation practices to achieve sustainability performance
3. Methodology: This study employs both qualitative and quantitative approach to conduct
interview-based case studies, as shown in Figure 1. This research tries to study the impact of
lean practices and SOI on the SMEs sustainability. There is currently little discussed about the
impact of SOI and Lean practices together on the SMEs sustainability. Hence this study tries
to opt for an exploratory approach by interview case studies. The use of interview method and
case study for exploratory type of research is well established in research (Voss et al.,2002;
Yin, 2008).
A review of existing literature was conducted to serve two purposes: (1) identify the constructs
for sustainability, lean and sustainability-oriented innovation that will aid in identifying
characteristics of SMEs. This will aid in formulating a questionnaire with an array of questions
representing each construct that will be used in the case-study; (2) developing the DEA model,
with input and output variables drawn from the constructs identified in (1). The questionnaire
comprised of both objective type questions (linguistic variable used for rating) and subjective
type questions (to get qualitative feedback), which will aid in understanding the characteristics
of SMEs. 35 manufacturing SMEs from eastern part of India, which are registered with
Federation of Small & Medium Industries (FOSMI) were recruited to conduct the case study.
The case study took the form of semi-structured interviews with 4 respondents in each SME.
SMEs have lesser organisational hierarchy compared to larger organisation, hence 4
respondents from each case SME was considered as adequate. The study was conducted in
between 2016 to 2017. Table 2 represents the sample demographic of the case study conducted
on sample SMEs.
Table 2. Sample demographics summary
Title Percentage Title Percentage
Owner 2 Firm age (years)
Production manager 20 Less than equal 5 11
Marketing manager 11 5 – 10 44
Supply chain manager 40 10 – 20 24
Purchasing manager 15 Greater than 20 21
Quality manager 2 Number of employees
Maintenance manager 10 10 - 50 30

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Industry category 50 - 150 40

Primary metal manufacturing 17 150 – 250 30
Fabricated metal product 15 Respondent location
Manufacturing 41 India-West Bengal 100
Electrical equipment and 17 Years in current position
components manufacturing Less than 5 9
Chemical manufacturing 10 6 - 10 60
More than 10 31

For each case SME, each response to the objective type questions was first translated from the
linguistic variable to a numerical variable. Next, the responses from all the four respondents
were consolidated, and the mean value was calculated, for each objective type question.
Finally, the data was processed into the excel sheet shown in the Appendix A. A data sheet was
used to run the sustainable supply chain performance DEA model. The results from DEA
(Table 2) are used to identify efficient and inefficient SMEs (using VRS – Variable Return to
Scale values). Next, for benchmarking, peers are assigned to inefficient SMEs. The peer
assignment is followed by analysis of the practices for both inefficient and peer SMEs, which
will be used to making recommendations for improving the sustainability performance of
inefficient SMEs through a proper trade-off between lean practices and sustainability oriented
innovation. Figure 1 shows the research framework adopted for conducting the study.

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Figure 1 Research Methodology

4 Input oriented BCC DEA Model Formulation

In this study, the ‘BCC input-oriented model’ of DEA proposed by Banker et al. (1984), under
the assumption of VRS has been formulated because this model is output translation invariant.

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We have 35 DMUs (each DMU representing an SME), where every DMUj, j = 1, 2,…,35,
produces the same 4 outputs (i.e. performance variables) in different capacity, yrj (r = 1,2,
…,4), using the same 2 inputs (lean practices and sustainability oriented innovation), xij (i =
1,2), in different amounts. The efficiency of a specific DMU can be evaluated by the above
BCC, in ‘envelopment form’, as follows:
𝐵𝐶𝐶
Min 𝜃 𝑘
where x are inputs, y are outputs (1)

∑2 ∑35 𝜆 𝑥 ≤𝜃𝐵𝐶𝐶
𝑘 𝑥𝑖𝑘
(2)
𝑖 = 1 𝑗 = 1 𝑗 𝑖𝑗

∑4 ∑35 𝜆 𝑦 ≥𝑦𝑖𝑘 (3)

𝑖 = 1 𝑗 = 1 𝑗 𝑖𝑗

∑35 𝜆𝑗= 1 (4)

𝑗=1

𝜆𝑗≥0 all are positive (5)

where 𝜃𝑘 is the radial efficiency factor showing the rate of reduction to the input levels of firm
k; λj is the intensity factor showing the contribution of firm j in the derivation of the efficiency
‒ +
of firm k; 𝑠 𝑖 ; 𝑠 𝑟 are slack variables accounting for extra savings in input i and extra gains in
output r. The above problem is repeated 35 times to cover all SMEs. Every time the
corresponding linear programming problem is solved to give each SME’s efficiency rating𝜃.
Firms with solution 𝜃 =1 are considered as relative efficient or benchmark firms and determine
the efficient frontier, while firms for which 𝜃 < 1 are considered to be inefficient.
Selection of variables: The DEA model will use a set of input and output variables to
determine the efficiency of each DMU (relative to other DMUs). The sustainability
performance is considered as output variable in the input-based DEA model. This is based upon
the Critical Success Factor of SMEs, which has been identified during case study and drawn
from the sustainability literature presented in Table 1. However, the SMEs have revealed that
it is economically challenging to implement lean practices. It encouraged us to separate
economic constructs and operational constructs in sustainability performance measurement.

SMEs suffer from resource constraint, lack of resources, lack of formalised planning, and
difficulty in attracting finance, which prevents them from effective engagement in the
sustainability oriented innovation process. SMEs innovate differently compared to a larger
organisation because the former have different organisational structure, strategy and policies
in place. Sustainability oriented innovation intended for SMEs aims to redesign operations
within the value chain to produce goods and services. Sustainability oriented innovation has
been categorised as process innovation, organisation innovation and product innovation
(Klewitz et. al, 2016). In this context, the process innovation consists of: cleaner production,
waste handling and logistics. The product innovation consists of: eco design, life cycle analysis,
alternative materials, design, waste handling, and eco-efficiency. The organisational
innovation consists of: EMS, ISO 14001, Environmental Management System, Innovation
process, Supply chain management, and organisation structure including stakeholders’ vision.
The driving factors to implement lean in SMEs are reduction in cost, reduction in inventory,
lead time, improved quality and reliability of products delivered to supplier and customer
(Zhou, 2016). Hence, the questions asked for implementation of lean practices in SMEs during

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the case study take into account inventory, number of employees, lean practices performed,
effectiveness of lean practices, demand forecast, effectiveness of inventory management,
inventory management policy, capacity utilization, and customer feedback. The motivation is
to understand the effect of lean practices and sustainability-oriented innovation on
sustainability (output variable), so the lean and sustainability-oriented innovation constructs
are taken as input in the DEA model. The existing literature helps in identifying the constructs
of lean and sustainability-oriented innovation. Table 2 shows the constructs for the lean and
SOI. Figure 2 shows the constructs identified from the Table 3. Figure 2 highlights the
constructs and their commonalities derived from literature.

Infrastructure
Number of employees
Cost

Lean
Transparency
Community strategy
Better quality
TPM
TQM
Waste reduction
End to end SCM
Workforce empowerment
Product and process design
Improved resource and inventory utilisation
Reduction energy consumption and emissions
EMS
Sustainability
Sustainability
Oriented Innovation
Employee Engagement To CSR
Eco design
greening material and packaging
CSR practices

Figure 2 Lean, Sustainability-Oriented Innovation and Sustainability

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Table 3. Constructs for sustainability performance

Constructs Citations
Lean Practices Cost Abdul-Rashid et al., 2017
Infrastructure Inman and Green,2018
Number Of Employee Piercy et al., 2015
Transparency Piercy and Brammer ,2012
Community Strategy
Better quality
TPM
TQM
Long Term Relationship With Customers
CRM Effectiveness
Demand Uncertainty
Waste Reduction
End To End Supply Chain Management
Workforce Empowerment
Product And Process Design
Improved Resources And Inventory
Utilisation
EMS
Reduced Energy Consumption And
Emission
Sustainability Long Term Relationship With Customers Klewitz et al., 2018,
oriented CRM Effectiveness Adams et al., (2016)
innovation Demand Uncertainty
Waste Reduction
End To End Supply Chain Management
Workforce Empowerment
Product And Process Design
Improved Resources And Inventory
Utilisation
Reduced Energy Consumption And Emission
EMS
Employee engagement to CSR
Eco design
Greening material and packaging
CSR practise
Reduction energy consumption and
emissions
Social Management-practices
CSR practices
Health and safety practices
Social Management Performance
CSR performance
Health and safety performance

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Figure 3 summarizes the conceptual DEA model, where lean practices and sustainability
oriented innovation are taken as input variables, and SMEs’ economic, operational,
environmental and social performance are the output variables. The DEA model is used to
identify the efficient and inefficient SMEs, which will aid inefficient SMEs to explore different
ways of implementing lean-based sustainability oriented innovation practices to improve their
sustainability performance (by learning from efficient SMEs, i.e. peers)

Turnover
Infrastructure Econmic
Business growth
Number of Employees
Lean perception
Lean effectiveness
Waste management practices Long term relationship with customers
Lean practices CRM effectiveness
Standard business process
Demand uncertainty
(Demand forecasting, effective raw material,
Operational Long term relationship with sup[pliers
inventory management, management policy, SME effectiveness
capacity utilisation, customer feedback) Supply uncertainty
DMUj
Business process effectiveness
j=1,2,....35

Environmental management system Effectiveness of environmental system

Adopting standardised environmental system Waste reduction
Demand uncertainty Environment
Sustainability Reduction of energy consumption and
Reduced energy consumption and emissions oriented emissions
Waste reduction innovation
Eco design
Supply chain coordination CSR performance
Social
Health and performance

INPUT
OUTPUT

Figure 3 Conceptual model for DEA to measure the combined impact of lean and
sustainability-oriented innovation on the sustainability performance of the SMEs
5 Application
Figure 4 summarizes the approach used for making recommendation to improve the
performance through sustainability-oriented innovation and lean practices to SMEs. The input
and output variables (obtained after the case studies) are fed to the DEA model. The result takes
the form of a table (Table 4), which is used to first identify the efficient and inefficient DMUs.
In this context, if the VRS value less than one, the corresponding DMU is inefficient, and the
rank determines inefficiency relative to all other DMUs. Next, peers are assigned to the each
inefficient DMU, i.e. benchmarking. The aim is to select a peer (SME), which has similar
characteristics to the inefficient SME, to aid in making recommendations. This is achieved by
selecting the peer with highest lambda value. Once the peer is selected, a comparative analysis
is performed for two purposes: (1) Using the Returns to Scale (in Table 4) and Diff % columns
(in Appendix 1), to understand whether the inefficient SME has to increase or decrease lean
and sustainability oriented innovation for improving their sustainability performance; (2)
Making recommendations to the inefficient SME for improving their performance, by looking
at the lean and sustainability oriented innovation practices of the peer SME (i.e. learning from
peer).
Table 4 shows efficiency summary of the participating Indian SMEs. From Table 4, shows that
based upon VRS the 23 SMEs-DMUs are inefficient. There are SMEs with increasing return

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to scale (IRS), constant return to scale (CRS) and decreasing return to scale (DRS) respectively.
The column 3 of table 4 shows the VRS efficiency of the 35 Indian SMEs. We assume the
variable return to scale assumption to be suitable for the study. The analysis gives us the peers
shown in the sixth column with which the SMEs should benchmark.

Figure 4 Analysing the results obtained from DEA for making recommendations to the
SMEs

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SCORE

DMU1
1.000000004
DMU35 DMU2
DMU34 DMU3
DMU33 DMU4
DMU32 DMU5
0.900000003
DMU31 DMU6

DMU30 DMU7

DMU29 0.800000001 DMU8

DMU28 DMU9

0.7 Score
DMU27 DMU10

DMU26 DMU11

DMU25 DMU12

DMU24 DMU13

DMU23 DMU14

DMU22 DMU15
DMU21 DMU16
DMU20 DMU17
DMU19 DMU18

Figure 5 Radar representation of efficiency of the sample SMEs

Figure 5 depicts the results of the analysis of the efficiency of the sample SMEs. The SMEs on
the score value 1 is identified as efficient. However, the SMEs not achieving the score of 1 are
inefficient. The Table 4 represents the efficiency summary of the 35 Indian SMEs.
Table 4 Efficiency summary of 35 Indian SMEs
SMEs CRS VRS SCALE Returns Peers Rank
efficiency to Scale
DMU1 0.969 0.977 0.992 drs 7 5 13 6 3 23
DMU2 0.763 0.772 0.989 drs 4 18 7 3 5 13 35
DMU3 1 1 1 - 3 1
DMU4 1 1 1 - 4 1
DMU5 1 1 1 - 5 1
DMU6 1 1 1 - 6 1
DMU7 0.951 1 0.951 drs 7 1
DMU8 0.958 1 0.958 drs 8 1
DMU9 0.956 0.96 0.996 irs 4 14 13 3 5 27
DMU10 0.968 0.97 0.998 drs 4 30 14 18 21 25
13
DMU11 1 1 1 - 11 1
DMU12 0.97 0.978 0.992 drs 4 13 3 22
DMU13 1 1 1 - 13 1
DMU14 1 1 1 - 14 1
DMU15 0.942 0.945 0.997 irs 13 3 14 6 28
DMU16 0.905 0.931 0.972 irs 24 3 11 21 29
DMU17 0.919 0.924 0.995 irs 21 6 5 14 30

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DMU18 1 1 1 - 18 1
DMU19 0.929 1 0.929 drs 19 1
DMU20 0.949 1 0.949 drs 20 1
DMU21 1 1 1 - 21 1
DMU22 0.803 0.826 0.972 drs 21 7 6 34
DMU23 0.966 1 0.966 drs 23 1
DMU24 1 1 1 - 24 1
DMU25 0.837 0.847 0.988 drs 3 4 21 5 7 6 33
DMU26 0.832 1 0.832 drs 26 18
DMU27 0.92 0.986 0.933 drs 4 19 30 20 20
DMU28 0.939 0.96 0.978 drs 21 31 30 18 26
DMU29 0.976 0.981 0.994 irs 31 4 21 30 24 21
DMU30 1 1 1 - 30 1
DMU31 1 1 1 - 31 1
DMU32 0.889 0.898 0.99 drs 4 21 23 24 31
DMU33 0.849 0.887 0.957 drs 21 3 23 31 18 32
DMU34 0.912 0.976 0.935 drs 4 31 23 30 19 24
DMU35 0.948 0.997 0.952 drs 18 19 20 7 19
Note: (1) IRS, CRS and DRS denote the increasing returns to scale, constant return to scale,
and decreasing returns to scale, respectively; (2) CRS, VRS denotes the efficiencies in CCR
and BCC model in DEA respectively.
The case study has been conducted for case organisation DMU 1 (inefficient) and DMU 13
(efficient) to identify the potential recommendation for DMU1. The comparative analysis is
discussed below. Looking into results presented in Tables 2, the inefficient case SME, DMU
2, can be benchmarked with the efficient DMU 4.
(Case description of DMU 1, DMU 2, DMU 13 and DMU 4 are attached in Appendix A2).
Case 1: DMU 1 benchmarks with DMU 13. SME 1 would benchmark to SME 13 and try to
develop the SWOT strategies for its improvement. The table 5 shows the SWOT analysis of
SME1 learning from SME 13. The improvements are based on the learning and benchmarking.
Objective of the SWOT: To analyze the strength, weakness, opportunity and threats of the SME
1 and hence learn from benchmark company SME 13 to come up with the strength-opportunity
strategy, strength-threat strategy, weakness-opportunity strategy, and weakness threats
strategy.

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Table 5 SWOT analysis for the SME 1 learning from benchmark SME 13
Internal Strength Weakness
Long term relationship with Throughput not achieved
customers Communication gaps between
Bid winning ability management
Rejection rate is high
External Infrastructure issue
Higher investment
Opportunity STRATEGIES
Customer relationship management Improve quality
Developing strategic relationship Improve delivery time
Demand
with a few customers Reduce constant
Newer
Make flat hierarchy
technology
Flexibility
Threat Supplier Relationship Management Train manpower to cope with the
Labor Market Risk Management uncertainty
Competition Collaboration with competitors for
Uncertainty bigger procurement
in supply

Strengths: The company strengths are it has long term relationship with its customer. It ensures
a stable market and ensures a reduced demand uncertainty. SME 1 also has a good bid winning
capacity due to its innovative product design.
Weakness: The company struggles to achieve the throughput. The company struggles with
lead time and on-time delivery. Additionally, there is a communication gaps between
management. This leads to higher rejection of products. SME needs to re-organise themselves
on the plant layout to reduce the movement of their man and material. The improvements
require high investment.
Opportunity: The SME1 has a good demand and a stable market base. The SME has an
opportunity to attract more customers due to newer technology. The flexibility of SME to
produce different types of product help the SME play a significant part in the competition.
Threat: SME faces threat from the labor market. There are few unresolved employee and
management issues which cannot be efficiently negotiated due to threats from union. The
market is very competitive. The suppliers sometimes cause uncertainty in supply material.
Strength – opportunity strategy: A long term customer relationship management is required.
It will help in developing strategic relationship with a few customers.
Strengths-threat: There is a need for the supplier Relationship Management. It will help to
develop a better communication with the supplier and reduce the supplier uncertainty. The risk
management needs to be practiced in the company. The SME can Collaborate with competitors
for bigger procurement and tendering.
Weakness- opportunity: Improve quality of the products which will reduce the rejection rate.
The delivery time-throughput is the critical issue so proper optimisation of the process needs
to be done. To remove the communication gap between the management, flat hierarchy of the
company should be practiced.
Weakness and threat: Train manpower to cope with the uncertainty.

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Projects developed from the above SWOT analysis indicate improvement strategies required
for process improvement. Process improvement which leads to developing customer
relationship management, supplier relationship management and reduction in the inventory.
There is a requirement of improvement in quality and establishing long-term relationship. The
improvement program needs to include a skill development of manpower by appropriate
training. Implementing the ERP is needed for the integration of the process at different levels
of the supply chain.

Case 2: DMU 2 benchmarks with DMU 4. SME 2 would benchmark to SME 4 and try to
develop the SWOT strategies for its improvement. Table 6 shows the SWOT analysis for the
SME2 learning from benchmark SME 4.The improvements are based on the learning and
benchmarking with SME 4.
Objective of the SWOT: To analyse the strength, weakness, opportunity and threats of the
SME 2 and hence learn from benchmark company SME 4. It helps SME 2 to come up with the
strength-opportunity strategy, strength-threat strategy, weakness-opportunity strategy, and
weakness threats strategy.
Strengths: The company is very competitive as it is able to offer significant low-price products
at reasonable good quality and in time.
Weakness: The company struggles with ineffective inventory management, ineffective
capacity utilisation, and is less efficient with the manpower it employs. The company has lack
of cross functional cooperation. Employee well-being is a major concern. Their major focus
remains on the economic practices. The employees face grave safety issues. The company has
logistics issue and practice high manual intervention due to using cheap manpower.
Opportunity: The SME 2 has a good demand and a stable market base. The low-cost produce
faces stiff competition in the market.
Threat: High maintenance cost of the production, competition, uncertainty in the market, union
and government regulation pose threat to the organisation.
Strength – opportunity strategy: There is a need for machine replacement: manual to semi-
automatic, training manpower, optimisation of the work process and limited overtime to be
given to the employees.
Strengths-threat: There is a need for training manpower, optimisation of the work process
and limited overtime to be given to the employees.
Weakness- opportunity: Weakness and threats: There is a potential for eco design, work in
progress inventory and waste management practices.

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Table 6 SWOT analysis for solving the SME 2 learning from benchmark SME 4

Internal Strength Weakness

Cost cutting Ineffective inventory management
Ineffective capacity utilisation
Reasonable good quality
On time delivery Less efficient
Lack of cross functional
cooperation
Employee well being
major focus on economic practices
Safety issues
External
Major focus on the economic
practices
Safety issues
Logistics issue
High manual intervention
Cheap manpower
Opportunity STRATEGY
Machine replacement: Eco design
Demand manual to semi- Work In Progress inventory
High competitiveness automatic Waste management Practices
Threat Training manpower
High maintenance cost of optimization
the production Limited overtime
Competition
Uncertainty in the market
Union
Government Regulation

Projects developed from the above SWOT analysis indicate improvement strategies are
required. There is a need for machine replacement: manual to semi-automatic, training
manpower, optimisation of the work process and limited overtime to be given to the employees.
There is a potential for eco design, work in progress inventory and waste management
practices. The above peer benchmark has been possible done by benchmarking it with the
proper SMEs.
Discussion:
Lean practices are essentially efficiency focused approaches, which emphasize on waste
reduction, and productivity improvement. Therefore, lean by default helps to achieve
sustainability of SMEs through reducing cost, enhancing quality and addressing various
environmental issues such as energy and waste reduction and resource efficiency (Inman and
Green,2018). However, many lean approaches may not be environmental and social friendly
(e.g. usage of raw materials that are low cost but not environment friendly, training cost,
reduction etc.) (Piercy et al., 2015). Lean principle provides technical solution but fails to
integrate social and environmental aspects to achieve sustainability. Approaching sustainability
needs both social aspects as well as technical aspects. Sustainability oriented innovation can
provide the social, environment aspect required to approach sustainability. Unlike lean,

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innovation emphasizes on responsiveness (customers’ satisfaction) over efficiency to facilitate

achieving sustainability. This study was able to highlight the impact of lean principle and SOI
on sustainability of SMEs’ supply chain. Lean practices focus only on the process improvement
while SOI focuses on product, process and organization innovation. Lean principles are very
focused (Piercy et al., 2015) while SOI are broad focus hence a tradeoff helps in achieving the
sustainability. The study identified there are commonalities when trying to implement lean
and sustainability-oriented innovation principles to achieve sustainability.
SWOT analysis and the case considered show that because of both lean and SOI can help
achieve sustainability. Studies have said lean and SOI help achieve sustainability (Piercy et
al.,2015; Klewitz et al.,2016). The four case studies clearly indicate the lean practices and SOI
helps in approaching Sustainability of the SMEs supply chain. The comparison of the case
study shows that the SME1 and SME 2 have lean practices but to implement lean SOI is
required. (This is in consideration with the prior studies of Florida (1996),Piery et al., (2015)).
Lean practices can prohibit approaching sustainability due to the cost associated in
implementing lean while the innovation can help SMEs approach sustainability (Benner and
Tushman , 2003). The proposed framework helps SMEs to adopt suitable strategy and plans to
improve their sustainability. Various lean and sustainability-oriented innovation practices are
considered as input criteria, and economic, operational, environmental and social criteria are
considered as output. As it is impossible to get secondary information of these criteria this
study gathered primary data from a group of SMEs in a specific region (Eastern part of India)
using a questionnaire through interviews with the key personnel. This research adopts Data
Envelopment Analysis (DEA) as a technique to analyse efficiency of the participating SMEs
with respect lean and sustainability-oriented innovation practices and sustainability
performance. DEA is the most appropriate method for analysing efficiency of the SMEs over
other contemporary methods such as multiple criteria decision-making methods (e.g. the AHP,
ANP, Fuzzy etc.) due to nature of the problem and characteristics of the criteria for the
proposed framework of analysis.
The results reveal that SMEs can approach sustainability through adopting specific process of
lean and sustainability-oriented innovation. The proposed DEA – based framework for
analysing impact of lean and sustainability-oriented innovation on sustainability performance
helps SMEs achieve sustainability through adopting right combination of lean and
sustainability-oriented innovation practices. This framework is useful to policymakers to
segregate efficient SMEs and suggest improvement measures for the inefficient SMEs by
proving funds and facilitating their business growth by objectively determining how to enhance
their sustainability. This framework is useful to the individual SME in order derive their
specific state of sustainability and improvement measures if inefficient through benchmarking
with their peers.
Our methods has implications both for researcher and policy makers. Previous studies have not
included all aspects of sustainability and fail to provide individual solutions to each SME. This
framework has been able to help policy makers make appropriate comparison with the peers.
Based on the results and methods demonstrated above, this study helps managers and policy
makers in three ways: firstly, to focus on segregation of SMEs into efficient and inefficient
SMEs. Secondly it helps the SMEs to benchmark themselves with appropriate peers SMEs and
thirdly develop their own SWOT derived strategies and projects after learning from the

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benchmark SMEs. The interaction with benchmark SMEs help them identify the common
interactions and inspires themselves with the idea to identify their own improvement projects.
Conclusion:
This study reports on a case study approach as how SMEs can be segregated considering the
lean and SOI as input for the Supply chain sustainability. From the study and recommendations,
it was shown how lean and SOI strategies can help in achieving sustainability. The previous
study failed to segregate and propose solution to SOI and Lean practices considered for
improving sustainability.
From managerial perspective this study has clear implications. The framework can be used as
a tool to benchmark the performance of SMEs and aid as a tool in improving SMEs supply
chain sustainability. The suggestions made available and peer benchmarking can help SMEs to
improve their supply chain sustainability. In the paper a wide explanation as how to use the
framework as tool is explained. This will provide policy makers and stakeholders a clear tool
to assess and make required improvements.
Contribution:
This research contributes to the existing Supply chain sustainability measurement literature.
Data Envelopment Model: this particular DEA model can help the SMEs assess their efficiency
and segregate themselves based on their lean and SOI practices. The study has been able to
give a framework to analyses the efficiency of the SMEs considering the lean and SOI as
practices. This is of interest to policy maker, consortium/ cluster of SMEs as they will be able
to use the framework to segregate the SMEs into efficient and inefficient SMEs. The
framework would help in giving a summarized overview of the SME characteristics within a
region identified as an inefficient SMEs, pair them with inefficient SMEs and improve their
sustainability by striving a suitable balance between lean and SOI.
SME managers: DEA helps in pairing and collaborate with appropriate peers. The framework
helps to formally adopt, implement appropriate strategies and harness best practices, which
have been deemed suitable and beneficial from the benchmarking and SWOT analysis.
Limitations:
The aim of the study is to propose a framework to segregate the efficiency of SMEs supply
chain sustainability based on their lean and SOI practices. However, the study does face
limitations in the nature, size of the industries and sample of the study which limits it from
generalisation. The study was conducted in the Eastern part of India. The SMEs taken in
consideration are Indian manufacturing SMEs and may not be generalised to other countries
due to difference in lean and SOI implementation in different economies (M. Dora et al., 2016).
Future directions:
However, this study has highlighted the insights for future trends in the research. It has been
evident from the literature and conducted case study that SMEs and policy makers can look
forward for understanding and monitoring their efficiency. Future research is possible to look
forward to study between different regions, and economies. It will be an interesting study to
see the impact of the policy, funding and legislation on lean and SOI on its impact on Supply

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chain sustainability. Further study can be done to study the impact of the CSR along with lean
and SOI on the Supply chain sustainability of SMEs.

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 Lean Practice Innovation Economic performance Operation Performance Environment performance Social performance

No. DMU Score Rank Data Projection Diff.(%) Data Projection Diff.(%) Data Projection Diff.(%) Data Projection Diff.(%) Data Projection Diff.(%) Data Proje Diff.(%)
ction
1 DMU1 0.98 23 3.69 3.61 2.27 3.33 3.25 2.27 4.50 4.50 0.00 3.20 4.09 27.90 0.98 23.00 3.69 3.61 2.27 3.33
2 DMU2 0.77 35 4.03 3.11 22.75 4.38 3.38 22.75 4.50 4.50 0.00 3.90 3.90 0.00 0.77 35.00 4.03 3.11 22.75 4.38
3 DMU3 1.00 1 2.69 2.69 0.00 3.13 3.13 0.00 3.50 3.50 0.00 3.23 3.23 0.00 1.00 1.00 2.69 2.69 0.00 3.13
4 DMU4 1.00 1 3.03 3.03 0.00 3.43 3.43 0.00 5.50 5.50 0.00 3.93 3.93 0.00 1.00 1.00 3.03 3.03 0.00 3.43
5 DMU5 1.00 1 3.76 3.76 0.00 3.08 3.08 0.00 6.00 6.00 0.00 4.27 4.27 0.00 1.00 1.00 3.76 3.76 0.00 3.08
6 DMU6 1.00 1 3.76 3.76 0.00 3.15 3.15 0.00 4.50 4.50 0.00 4.24 4.24 0.00 1.00 1.00 3.76 3.76 0.00 3.15
7 DMU7 1.00 1 4.40 4.40 0.00 4.03 4.03 0.00 5.50 5.50 0.00 4.68 4.68 0.00 1.00 1.00 4.40 4.40 0.00 4.03
8 DMU8 1.00 1 3.29 3.29 0.00 3.98 3.98 0.00 4.50 4.50 0.00 3.68 3.68 0.00 1.00 1.00 3.29 3.29 0.00 3.98
9 DMU9 0.96 27 3.10 2.97 4.04 3.10 2.97 4.04 4.50 4.50 0.00 3.58 3.58 0.00 0.96 27.00 3.10 2.97 4.04 3.10
10 DMU10 0.97 25 3.14 3.04 3.13 3.03 2.94 3.13 3.50 3.50 0.00 4.02 4.02 0.00 0.97 25.00 3.14 3.04 3.13 3.03
11 DMU11 1.00 1 2.14 2.14 0.00 3.09 3.09 0.00 2.00 2.00 0.00 2.92 2.92 0.00 1.00 1.00 2.14 2.14 0.00 3.09
12 DMU12 0.98 22 3.03 2.96 2.15 3.47 3.39 2.17 4.50 4.50 0.00 3.45 3.77 9.53 0.98 22.00 3.03 2.96 2.15 3.47
13 DMU13 1.00 1 3.11 3.11 0.00 3.59 3.59 0.00 3.50 3.50 0.00 4.02 4.02 0.00 1.00 1.00 3.11 3.11 0.00 3.59
14 DMU14 1.00 1 2.86 2.86 0.00 2.23 2.23 0.00 4.50 4.50 0.00 3.80 3.80 0.00 1.00 1.00 2.86 2.86 0.00 2.23
15 DMU15 0.95 28 3.71 3.51 5.44 3.40 3.21 5.44 3.50 4.20 20.14 4.08 4.08 0.00 0.95 28.00 3.71 3.51 5.44 3.40
16 DMU16 0.93 29 3.17 2.95 6.92 2.48 2.31 6.92 4.00 4.05 1.28 3.64 3.78 4.03 0.93 29.00 3.17 2.95 6.92 2.48
17 DMU17 0.92 30 3.96 3.66 7.64 3.25 3.00 7.64 5.00 5.00 0.00 4.09 4.20 2.84 0.92 30.00 3.96 3.66 7.64 3.25
18 DMU18 1.00 1 3.03 3.03 0.00 3.40 3.40 0.00 2.00 2.00 0.00 4.10 4.10 0.00 1.00 1.00 3.03 3.03 0.00 3.40
19 DMU19 1.00 1 4.40 4.40 0.00 4.30 4.30 0.00 6.00 6.00 0.00 4.69 4.69 0.00 1.00 1.00 4.40 4.40 0.00 4.30
20 DMU20 1.00 1 3.76 3.76 0.00 3.53 3.53 0.00 5.00 5.00 0.00 4.61 4.61 0.00 1.00 1.00 3.76 3.76 0.00 3.53
21 DMU21 1.00 1 3.46 3.46 0.00 1.78 1.78 0.00 5.00 5.00 0.00 4.54 4.54 0.00 1.00 1.00 3.46 3.46 0.00 1.78
22 DMU22 0.83 34 4.84 3.93 18.90 3.80 3.14 17.43 5.00 5.00 0.00 4.39 4.48 2.00 0.83 34.00 4.84 3.93 18.90 3.80
23 DMU23 1.00 1 4.61 4.61 0.00 3.65 3.65 0.00 7.00 7.00 0.00 4.55 4.55 0.00 1.00 1.00 4.61 4.61 0.00 3.65
24 DMU24 1.00 1 2.24 2.24 0.00 1.65 1.65 0.00 4.00 4.00 0.00 2.54 2.54 0.00 1.00 1.00 2.24 2.24 0.00 1.65
25 DMU25 0.85 33 4.24 3.59 15.29 3.70 3.13 15.29 5.00 5.00 0.00 4.19 4.19 0.00 0.85 33.00 4.24 3.59 15.29 3.70
26 DMU26 1.00 18 4.57 4.57 0.01 4.18 4.18 0.01 5.50 5.50 0.00 4.71 4.71 0.00 1.00 18.00 4.57 4.57 0.01 4.18
27 DMU27 0.99 20 3.71 3.66 1.41 3.50 3.42 2.42 5.50 5.50 0.00 4.44 4.44 0.00 0.99 20.00 3.71 3.66 1.41 3.50

28
28 DMU28 0.96 26 3.47 3.33 3.95 2.68 2.57 3.95 4.50 4.50 0.00 4.50 4.50 0.00 0.96 26.00 3.47 3.33 3.95 2.68
29 DMU29 0.98 21 3.04 2.98 1.83 2.68 2.63 1.83 5.00 5.00 0.00 4.06 4.06 0.00 0.98 21.00 3.04 2.98 1.83 2.68
30 DMU30 1.00 1 2.93 2.93 0.00 2.53 2.53 0.00 5.00 5.00 0.00 4.20 4.20 0.00 1.00 1.00 2.93 2.93 0.00 2.53
31 DMU31 1.00 1 3.36 3.36 0.00 2.83 2.83 0.00 4.83 4.83 0.00 4.60 4.60 0.00 1.00 1.00 3.36 3.36 0.00 2.83
32 DMU32 0.90 31 3.61 3.24 10.22 2.68 2.41 10.22 5.17 5.17 0.00 3.94 3.99 1.38 0.90 31.00 3.61 3.24 10.22 2.68
33 DMU33 0.89 32 4.21 3.74 11.26 3.60 3.19 11.26 5.00 5.00 0.00 3.93 4.41 12.32 0.89 32.00 4.21 3.74 11.26 3.60
34 DMU34 0.98 24 3.54 3.45 2.43 3.35 3.04 9.29 5.50 5.50 0.00 4.34 4.34 0.00 0.98 24.00 3.54 3.45 2.43 3.35
35 DMU35 1.00 19 3.64 3.62 0.42 3.63 3.61 0.42 4.00 4.05 1.23 4.44 4.44 0.00 1.00 19.00 3.64 3.62 0.42 3.63

Table A1 Efficiency summary of 35 Indian SMEs

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Table A2
Case description of DMU1, DMU2, DMU 13 and DMU 4.
Name product Industry Turnover Number
Type Of
Employees
DMU1 Jigs and 1.5 crore 38

Manufacturing
fixtures
DMU2 springs 4 crore 60
DMU13 Manufacturing 66666600Rs 48
of Fuel
Dispensing
Pump, meter
for volumetric
measurement.
DMU4 Parts for 2 crore 34
ordinance
factory

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Table 5 SWOT analysis for the SME 1 learning from benchmark SME 13
Internal Strength Weakness
Long term relationship with Throughput not achieved
customers Communication gaps between
Bid winning ability management
Rejection rate is high
External Infrastructure issue
Higher investment
Opportunity STRATEGIES
Customer relationship management Improve quality
Demand Developing strategic relationship Improve delivery time
Newer with a few customers Reduce constant
technology Make flat hierarchy
Flexibility
Threat Supplier Relationship Management Train manpower to cope with the
Labor Market Risk Management uncertainty
Competition Collaboration with competitors for
Uncertainty bigger procurement
in supply

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Table 6 SWOT analysis for solving the SME 2 learning from benchmark SME 4

Internal Strength Weakness

Cost cutting Ineffective inventory management
Reasonable good quality Ineffective capacity utilisation
On time delivery Less efficient
Lack of cross functional
cooperation
Employee well being
major focus on economic practices
Safety issues
External
Major focus on the economic
practices
Safety issues
Logistics issue
High manual intervention
Cheap manpower
Opportunity STRATEGY
Machine replacement: Eco design
Demand manual to semi- Work In Progress inventory
High competitiveness automatic Waste management Practices
Threat Training manpower
High maintenance cost of optimization
the production Limited overtime
Competition
Uncertainty in the market
Union
Government Regulation

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 Lean Practice Innovation Economic performance Operation Performance Environment performance Social performance

No DMU Scor Ran Dat Projectio Diff.(% Dat Projectio Diff.(% Dat Projectio Diff.(% Dat Projectio Diff.(% Dat Projectio Diff.(% Dat Proj Diff.(%
. e k a n ) a n ) a n ) a n ) a n ) a e )
ction
1 DMU1 0.98 23 3.69 3.61 2.27 3.33 3.25 2.27 4.50 4.50 0.00 3.20 4.09 27.90 0.98 23.00 3.69 3.61 2.27 3.33
2 DMU2 0.77 35 4.03 3.11 22.75 4.38 3.38 22.75 4.50 4.50 0.00 3.90 3.90 0.00 0.77 35.00 4.03 3.11 22.75 4.38
3 DMU3 1.00 1 2.69 2.69 0.00 3.13 3.13 0.00 3.50 3.50 0.00 3.23 3.23 0.00 1.00 1.00 2.69 2.69 0.00 3.13
4 DMU4 1.00 1 3.03 3.03 0.00 3.43 3.43 0.00 5.50 5.50 0.00 3.93 3.93 0.00 1.00 1.00 3.03 3.03 0.00 3.43
5 DMU5 1.00 1 3.76 3.76 0.00 3.08 3.08 0.00 6.00 6.00 0.00 4.27 4.27 0.00 1.00 1.00 3.76 3.76 0.00 3.08
6 DMU6 1.00 1 3.76 3.76 0.00 3.15 3.15 0.00 4.50 4.50 0.00 4.24 4.24 0.00 1.00 1.00 3.76 3.76 0.00 3.15
7 DMU7 1.00 1 4.40 4.40 0.00 4.03 4.03 0.00 5.50 5.50 0.00 4.68 4.68 0.00 1.00 1.00 4.40 4.40 0.00 4.03
8 DMU8 1.00 1 3.29 3.29 0.00 3.98 3.98 0.00 4.50 4.50 0.00 3.68 3.68 0.00 1.00 1.00 3.29 3.29 0.00 3.98
9 DMU9 0.96 27 3.10 2.97 4.04 3.10 2.97 4.04 4.50 4.50 0.00 3.58 3.58 0.00 0.96 27.00 3.10 2.97 4.04 3.10
10 DMU1 25
0.97 3.14 3.04 3.13 3.03 2.94 3.13 3.50 3.50 0.00 4.02 4.02 0.00 0.97 25.00 3.14 3.04 3.13 3.03
0
11 DMU1 1
1.00 2.14 2.14 0.00 3.09 3.09 0.00 2.00 2.00 0.00 2.92 2.92 0.00 1.00 1.00 2.14 2.14 0.00 3.09
1
12 DMU1 22
0.98 3.03 2.96 2.15 3.47 3.39 2.17 4.50 4.50 0.00 3.45 3.77 9.53 0.98 22.00 3.03 2.96 2.15 3.47
2
13 DMU1 1
1.00 3.11 3.11 0.00 3.59 3.59 0.00 3.50 3.50 0.00 4.02 4.02 0.00 1.00 1.00 3.11 3.11 0.00 3.59
3
14 DMU1 1
1.00 2.86 2.86 0.00 2.23 2.23 0.00 4.50 4.50 0.00 3.80 3.80 0.00 1.00 1.00 2.86 2.86 0.00 2.23
4
15 DMU1 28
0.95 3.71 3.51 5.44 3.40 3.21 5.44 3.50 4.20 20.14 4.08 4.08 0.00 0.95 28.00 3.71 3.51 5.44 3.40
5
16 DMU1 29
0.93 3.17 2.95 6.92 2.48 2.31 6.92 4.00 4.05 1.28 3.64 3.78 4.03 0.93 29.00 3.17 2.95 6.92 2.48
6
17 DMU1 30
0.92 3.96 3.66 7.64 3.25 3.00 7.64 5.00 5.00 0.00 4.09 4.20 2.84 0.92 30.00 3.96 3.66 7.64 3.25
7
18 DMU1 1
1.00 3.03 3.03 0.00 3.40 3.40 0.00 2.00 2.00 0.00 4.10 4.10 0.00 1.00 1.00 3.03 3.03 0.00 3.40
8
19 DMU1 1
1.00 4.40 4.40 0.00 4.30 4.30 0.00 6.00 6.00 0.00 4.69 4.69 0.00 1.00 1.00 4.40 4.40 0.00 4.30
9
20 DMU2 1
1.00 3.76 3.76 0.00 3.53 3.53 0.00 5.00 5.00 0.00 4.61 4.61 0.00 1.00 1.00 3.76 3.76 0.00 3.53
0
21 DMU2 1
1.00 3.46 3.46 0.00 1.78 1.78 0.00 5.00 5.00 0.00 4.54 4.54 0.00 1.00 1.00 3.46 3.46 0.00 1.78
1
22 DMU2 34
0.83 4.84 3.93 18.90 3.80 3.14 17.43 5.00 5.00 0.00 4.39 4.48 2.00 0.83 34.00 4.84 3.93 18.90 3.80
2
23 DMU2 1
1.00 4.61 4.61 0.00 3.65 3.65 0.00 7.00 7.00 0.00 4.55 4.55 0.00 1.00 1.00 4.61 4.61 0.00 3.65
3
24 DMU2 1
1.00 2.24 2.24 0.00 1.65 1.65 0.00 4.00 4.00 0.00 2.54 2.54 0.00 1.00 1.00 2.24 2.24 0.00 1.65
4
25 DMU2 33
0.85 4.24 3.59 15.29 3.70 3.13 15.29 5.00 5.00 0.00 4.19 4.19 0.00 0.85 33.00 4.24 3.59 15.29 3.70
5

3
 26 DMU2 18
1.00 4.57 4.57 0.01 4.18 4.18 0.01 5.50 5.50 0.00 4.71 4.71 0.00 1.00 18.00 4.57 4.57 0.01 4.18
6
27 DMU2 20
0.99 3.71 3.66 1.41 3.50 3.42 2.42 5.50 5.50 0.00 4.44 4.44 0.00 0.99 20.00 3.71 3.66 1.41 3.50
7
28 DMU2 26
0.96 3.47 3.33 3.95 2.68 2.57 3.95 4.50 4.50 0.00 4.50 4.50 0.00 0.96 26.00 3.47 3.33 3.95 2.68
8
29 DMU2 21
0.98 3.04 2.98 1.83 2.68 2.63 1.83 5.00 5.00 0.00 4.06 4.06 0.00 0.98 21.00 3.04 2.98 1.83 2.68
9
30 DMU3 1
1.00 2.93 2.93 0.00 2.53 2.53 0.00 5.00 5.00 0.00 4.20 4.20 0.00 1.00 1.00 2.93 2.93 0.00 2.53
0
31 DMU3 1
1.00 3.36 3.36 0.00 2.83 2.83 0.00 4.83 4.83 0.00 4.60 4.60 0.00 1.00 1.00 3.36 3.36 0.00 2.83
1
32 DMU3 31
0.90 3.61 3.24 10.22 2.68 2.41 10.22 5.17 5.17 0.00 3.94 3.99 1.38 0.90 31.00 3.61 3.24 10.22 2.68
2
33 DMU3 32
0.89 4.21 3.74 11.26 3.60 3.19 11.26 5.00 5.00 0.00 3.93 4.41 12.32 0.89 32.00 4.21 3.74 11.26 3.60
3
34 DMU3 24
0.98 3.54 3.45 2.43 3.35 3.04 9.29 5.50 5.50 0.00 4.34 4.34 0.00 0.98 24.00 3.54 3.45 2.43 3.35
4
35 DMU3 19
1.00 3.64 3.62 0.42 3.63 3.61 0.42 4.00 4.05 1.23 4.44 4.44 0.00 1.00 19.00 3.64 3.62 0.42 3.63
5
Table A1 Efficiency summary of 35 Indian SMEs