Over 30 companies from across the South East of Ireland attended a seminar today in Leighlinbridge, County Carlow aimed at increasing the competitiveness of companies by participating in a Lean Programme being delivered by the Local Enterprise Offices in Carlow, Kilkenny, Tipperary & Waterford and Enterprise Ireland.

The seminar offers companies the chance to avail of €50,000 worth of supports which are aimed to increase performance and competitiveness. The seminar was attended by companies from all sectors and applications are now open until end October 2016 for companies to avail of this opportunity.

Speaking about the benefits of Lean, Fiona Deegan, Head of Enterprise (Acting) for Kilkenny’s Local Enterprise Office said “It is well accepted by now that "lean thinking and practice" is more than just a kit of process improvement tools. That's what has always separated the practice of lean thinking from the various process improvement models that have come and gone over the past few decades, such as total quality management, six sigma, business process reengineering. Those toolkits were exactly that: toolkits to improve processes”, Ms. Deegan continued to say “it’s the aim of the Local Enterprise Offices to work on increasing capacity of indigenous companies so that they can reach their potential from an expansion, employment and opportunity viewpoint”.

The Lean for Micro Programme is one of many programmes being rolled out by the Local Enterprise Offices across the Region during 2016, and Ms. Deegan also added: “while local delivery is important , working as a Region is imperative for a variety of programmes which require the building of clusters which allow for effective delivery and this Lean for Micro Programme is just one example of the ways we can take the creative knowledge , resources and abilities of the Local Enterprise  Offices and provide effective , measurable and targeted supports on the ground support to growing companies”. 

For further information contact Fiona Deegan at fiona.deegan@leo.kilkennycoco.ie  or 056 7752662