Sask. ending Lean contract early

The province’s contract with an American consultation firm guiding Saskatchewan’s Lean program will be ending earlier than expected.

Saskatchewan’s original contract with John Black and Associates (JBA) began in 2012 to help implement the Lean management system. Lean aims to eliminate inefficiencies in order to save money and time in the province’s healthcare system. However, the cost of the program and results have been heavily criticized by the Opposition NDP.

On Monday, the province announced that the Ministry of Health has given notice to end the contract in 90 days. That moves up the end of the contract from the original June 2015 date to March 2015.

“We are going to see a savings of about $3 million by not going to the June end date,” Health Minister Dustin Duncan told reporters at the Legislature.

“While our relationship with JBA has been very worthwhile in terms of improving health service delivery and reducing costs in our health care system, we feel we have now reached a point where we can move forward on our own and, in doing so, we will be able reduce costs associated with continuing the JBA contract.”

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More than 200 workers have been certified as Lean leaders and will take over the role of training other staff.

“In no way (does) that mean Lean is coming to an end in Saskatchewan. We’re going to continue on with implementing Lean into the health care system here in the province. We’ve seen some good results in just a couple of year,” Duncan clarified.

“This government’s stubborn,” replied NDP leader Cam Broten.

The provincial opposition has criticized the SaskParty for months now, maintaining the province was planning on spending a total of $40 million on this consultant from the U.S. With the contract coming to an end early Duncan said the cost will be well under that mark, but couldn’t offer up a firm figure yet.

“Sending John Black to the golf course a few months earlier while ignoring the mess that’s been created through the John Black version of Lean here is not the answer,” Broten remarked.

He said many of the initiatives and programs Black had already implemented in the province will remain in place, including at least $17 million per year for Kaizen Promotion Offices along with other “bizarre” training.

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