Which aspect is emphasized in Lean Manufacturing?

In Lean Manufacturing, the core principle focuses on minimizing waste while maintaining or improving productivity. This approach is centered on streamlining processes to enhance efficiency and reduce costs, ensuring that resources are utilized effectively. By identifying and eliminating any form of waste—whether it's in materials, time, or labor—Lean practices aim to create more value for customers with fewer resources.

Promoting a culture of continuous improvement, Lean encourages teams to constantly look for ways to optimize their processes and reduce inefficiencies, which leads to better quality products and services. In contrast, maximizing labor expenses, increasing product variety, and lengthening production cycles would generally create additional complexity and potential waste, which is counter to the Lean philosophy.