"To improve your productivity you need to do two things," explains Professor Roger Schmenner. "Reduce sector variation and reduce the throughput time. In doing so you will uncover all of the problems that occur in a process. You'll see what to fix and that's how the waste will come out and improvements will be made."

New research reveals 12 steps for those who want to follow a business model innovation approach to service provision. The findings are also particularly relevant for policy-makers learning more about the shift towards complex services.

The Cambridge Service Alliance (CSA) digs down to find out what's happening in the 'Servitisation of Manufacturing'! Professor Andy Neely, Director of the CSA and Fellow of Cambridge Judge Business School, looks at the trends of the future that will bring about business success and the strategic, economic and environmental influences.

Dr Chris Tyler is the new Executive Director of CSaP (Centre for Science and Policy) based at Cambridge Judge Business School. Their seminars, policy placements, fellows and workshops will bring together leading academic strategists and those charged with taking policy into government at the highest level.

A new model for understanding how multinationals can gain a competitive edge from their manufacturing networks has been created as a result of a recent study by Professor Arnoud De Meyer, Director of Judge Business School, and Professor Ann Vereecke and Professor Roland Van Dierdonck of the Vlerick Leuven Gent Management School in Belgium.

In the current contracting economy, the pressure to achieve better cost savings is higher than ever. In the fourth edition of The Lean Toolbox Dr Matthias Holweg and his co-author John Bicheno provide a no nonsense, no waffle explanation of the dynamic evolution of lean from its roots in manufacturing to its adaptation to product development, service and even healthcare operations. Dr Holweg explains why lean, and its ability to improve the customer value proposition, can be also provide a longer term cost benefit to any organisation.

Today's ICT revolution is changing the way corporations, governments and non-profits are organised. The pyramid hierarchy is being replaced by a complex network of nodes where command and control has little leverage. Successful leaders will now be those who can demonstrate collaborative skills, achieving results by working with their peers; influencing, seducing and convincing them. They also need to have a friend in Lady Luck. Professor Arnoud De Meyer explains the role business schools need to play in this cultural shift.

Dr Matthias Holweg explains why the UK government needs to stop its ambivalent attitude towards the declining UK car industry, which although still competitive, is very fragile. It needs to fight for it now if it wants to save it and retain a balanced economy. If not, it faces having an economy built solely on the services industries, which as Dr Holweg points out, is a dangerous strategy as the recent crisis shows.

While the UK is unlikely to introduce American or Japanese "poison pill" remedies in hostile takeovers, boards of UK companies could be given more autonomy to balance worker and shareholder interests, says Simon Deakin, Professor of Law at Cambridge University and Cambridge Judge Business School Fellow.