An accounting professor from The University of Tennessee at Chattanooga has won the 2009 Excellence in Lean Accounting Awards from the Lean Enterprise Institute (LEI), a nonprofit education, publishing, conference, and management research company with a mission to advance lean thinking around the world.
Gerald DeBusk, Ph.D., assistant professor of accounting, University of Tennessee at Chattanooga received the award at the fifth annual Lean Accounting Summit conference, Sept. 23, in Orlando, Florida. His was one of two awards bestowed.
The annual award sponsored by LEI recognizes teachers or students who attended the previous year’s conference then applied what they learned in the classroom.
For example, after attending last year’s conference in Las Vegas, DeBusk introduced lean concepts and examples into his managerial accounting course for MBA students. His students not only learn traditional accounting concepts about such issues as inventory valuation and absorption, but also the lean management approach, which many students need back at work because their companies are undergoing a lean transformation.
“I get a lot of positive comments on bringing the real world into the classroom,” said DeBusk, who worked as a controller at a company implementing lean methods.
Lean Management
Organizers of the Lean Accounting Summit said the lean accounting movement seeks a shift from traditional cost accounting practices to practices that accurately measure and motivate companies implementing lean management principles.
Lean Enterprise Institute
The Lean Enterprise Institute, Inc. was founded in 1997 by management expert James P. Womack, Ph.D., as a nonprofit research, education, publishing, and conference company with a mission to advance lean thinking around the world. The institute teaches courses, holds management seminars, writes and publishes books and workbooks, and organizes public and private conferences.
