Are Lean principles theoretical or practical?
Practical. The people who originally developed Lean principles and practices were businessmen, not academics. They were spurred to seek resolutions to everyday operations problems by applying traditional scientific methodologies in new and creative ways. The resulting approaches they developed are simple yet very effective. They have been successfully applied to production and non-production activities in a broad range of industries. While training in the approach is important, Lean practices are learned and mastered by DOING!
