Lean supplier support

At National Highways we have a driven purpose to give value to our customers.

To help achieve our targets we use Lean to identify ways of improving our delivery and performance. We've been using Lean since 2009 and it's applicable to every part of the business. 

Lean links to our three imperatives of Safety, Customer and Delivery and we use it from team level to workstream level, looking at end-to-end value streams where we invite challenge to improve current processes.

We encourage our supply chain partners to adopt Lean principles and foster a culture of continuous improvement - to mutual advantage. Successful implementation of Lean has shown improvements of over 25% in the areas of time, cost and quality, along with improved employee satisfaction.

There is a dedicated National Highways Lean team who will support you with any Lean challenges or queries - you can contact the Lean team via email. You’ll also find a range of tools, guides and standards within this support page to aid you as you strive for continuous improvement and ultimately Lean perfection within your organisation.

HELMA

The Highways Excellence Lean Maturity Assessment (HELMA) aims to help organisations in the National Highways supply chain determine the extent to which they have adopted Lean principles.

The objective of the assessment process is to recognise where Lean principles are being deployed successfully as well as highlight areas for improvement and use this information to help drive the Lean deployment process.

Find out more on our HELMA support page.

Lean support

We offer a range of support to our suppliers to enable you to adopt and improve Lean principles in your work with us, including a dedicated team of Lean experts.

Suppliers will also have access to:

• the National Highways Lean Tracker
• our library of Knowledge Transfer Packs, detailing examples of Lean from across National Highways and our supply chain
• the Digital Efficiency Register
• the National Highways Major Projects Knowledge Management site, to help facilitate knowledge share of lessons learnt from across our Major Projects

Find out more about the support available on the Lean efficiencies and case studies page.

Learning resources

Lean is about making continuous improvement and implementing processes that result in improved workflow, value to the customer and optimised business efficiency.

Visit our learning resources page to access information relating to our minimum standards and guidance which provide further detail to help suppliers comply with Lean requirements and good practice.