Agility, a Modern Narrative of Old Concepts

Agile manufacturing as the most modern production system has covered significant portion of literature in operations management. But there is a great vague. whether agile manufacturing is the same as prior concepts but in a new form or it's a completely new concept accompanied with necessary techniques? Lean production and Agile production are two dominant production systems that were studied through literature survey and their dimensions were defined. Then dimensions similarities and differences among these two approaches were investigated. Finally considering the importance of different dimensions, weighted difference between them is demonstrated. Results show that although there are some common features between these two concepts, their emphasis on different aspects has formed a new approach. The proper attention of agile system to nowadays business requirements and continuous change, has distinguished it from other production systems such as lean production system.