The LCS Awards Finalists 2026
Celebrating excellence in Improvement, recognising individuals and organisations that have made a significant impact in the field.
Individual: LCS Global Champion Award
Debashis Sarkar
Debashis was selected for his outstanding and long-standing contribution to continuous improvement globally. With more than three decades of experience, pioneering work in service Lean, published thought leadership and international recognition, his influence on the profession is exceptional.
Lyndsay MacLeod
Lyndsay stood out for her global Lean-Agile leadership and her human-centred approach to transformation. Her work has influenced thousands of colleagues across multiple continents, helping organisations build capability, improve flow and embed continuous improvement in modern digital environments.
David Leiva
David was selected for his international impact as a Lean Six Sigma Master Black Belt and Lean Sensei. His work across industries and countries shows a deep commitment to developing people, coaching leaders and helping organisations build sustainable, data-driven improvement cultures.
Gregory Szkotnicki
Gregory was selected for his role as a powerful executive champion for Lean at GuideWell. His leadership helped make continuous improvement credible, visible and scalable across a major healthcare enterprise, supporting hundreds of projects and thousands of hours of waste reduction.
Husain Al-Omani
Husain impressed the judges with his international contribution to quality, Six Sigma and continuous improvement. His leadership in professional bodies, conference activity, awards and published work show a strong and sustained commitment to advancing the profession globally.
Organisation: LCS Organisation of the Year Award
RS Group UK
RS Group UK was selected for showing how Lean and CI capability can mature across a market and support complex, cross-functional challenges. Their journey demonstrated growing confidence, customer focus and improvement thinking moving into day-to-day practice.
GuideWell
GuideWell impressed with the scale and structure of its enterprise-wide improvement system. With hundreds of projects, hundreds of certified practitioners and significant waste reduction, the submission showed a mature and ambitious organisation-wide commitment to Lean.
OMRAN Group
OMRAN Group was selected for establishing continuous improvement as a strategic enabler for operational excellence and Oman’s tourism growth agenda. The judges liked the combination of leadership commitment, internal capability building, measurable impact and improvement across multiple entities.
Delgaz Grid
Delgaz Grid stood out for its long-running operational excellence journey across critical energy infrastructure. Its submission showed strong commitment to Lean, digitalisation, capability building and sustained improvement in a complex and important sector.
National Deaf Children’s Society
The National Deaf Children’s Society was selected for using Lean to support a powerful purpose: reaching every deaf child. Their redesign of Frontline Services, involving over 100 staff, has made it easier and faster for families to access support.
Organisation: LCS Culture of Improvement Award
Hilti After Market Services
Hilti After Market Services stood out for making Lean part of everyday work across a truly global operation. With Lean champions, local practitioners, digital tools and improvement routines embedded across 63 locations, their submission showed a culture where people are trusted, supported and encouraged to improve the work around them.
Frimley Health NHS Foundation Trust
Frimley Health impressed the judges with the maturity and scale of its Frimley Excellence approach. From FX Huddles to induction, leadership routines and capability building, improvement is clearly becoming part of the organisation’s everyday language and behaviour.
City of Jacksonville
The City of Jacksonville showed a brilliant shift in public sector improvement culture. Through the 904Lean initiative, teams across the city are challenging old ways of working, removing waste and improving services for residents — with hundreds of staff trained and major time savings already delivered.
Intellectual Property Office
The Intellectual Property Office was selected for embedding continuous improvement in a thoughtful, people-led way. Its focus on psychological safety, leadership behaviours, benefits tracking and local ownership showed a strong culture where colleagues feel confident to question, test and improve.
Quilter
Quilter demonstrated a clear commitment to creating an inclusive, supportive and values-led workplace. Their focus on collaboration, employee wellbeing and embedding positive cultural behaviours stood out as a strong example of culture being actively lived rather than simply stated.
Organisation: LCS Digital & AI-Enabled Improvement Award
Computacenter
Computacenter was selected for showing how analytics, automation and AI can strengthen Lean thinking rather than replace it. Their Triple A approach uses tools such as Copilot, Nexthink and AI agents to help teams see problems earlier, reduce waste and spend more time solving the right issues.
Shared Services Connected Ltd
SSCL impressed with its use of AI tools such as Luna, ORA and noise-isolation technology to improve customer experience, flow and quality. The judges liked the clear link between Lean-identified problems, responsible digital adoption and measurable results.
Reed in Partnership
Reed in Partnership stood out for using AI-enabled tools to make services more accessible and inclusive. Whether supporting translation, communication or adviser workflows, their submission showed technology being used in a very human way — helping people have better conversations and get better support.
Frimley Health NHS Foundation Trust
Frimley Health was selected for bringing digital and AI-enabled improvement into its wider Lean system. From faster discharge summaries to electronic frailty alerts and structured benefits reporting, the submission showed digital tools being used to improve flow, decision-making and patient outcomes.
QinetiQ Target Systems
QinetiQ Target Systems showed how low-cost digital tools can make CI easier to run, track and sustain. By using Power Automate, SharePoint and AI-supported apps, the team reduced admin, improved visibility and helped support more than 700 improvement activities.
Organisation: LCS Impact Excellence Award
A-Gas
A-Gas was selected for delivering clear operational impact through practical, shop-floor-led improvement. Their work showed how listening to teams, using data and tackling real process issues can unlock value, reduce waste and improve day-to-day performance.
Prototyp-Werke GmbH
Prototyp-Werke impressed with its ProtoSMART initiative, which shifted production from inspection-heavy working to built-in quality. The results included improved productivity, stronger process stability and the ability to run autonomous weekend shifts, a great example of sustainable manufacturing improvement.
OMRAN Group
OMRAN Group stood out for turning Lean learning and improvement activity into measurable value across the organisation. With projects across multiple functions and entities, the submission showed clear financial impact, stronger governance and growing internal capability.
University Hospitals Sussex NHS Foundation Trust
University Hospitals Sussex was selected for using Rapid Improvement Events to prepare for Electronic Patient Record implementation in a practical, staff-led way. Their work brought clinical, admin and IT teams together to redesign key processes and deliver measurable improvements for staff and patients.
Computacenter
Computacenter was selected for delivering impact through structured improvement in a complex managed services environment. Their work showed strong governance, stakeholder engagement and practical learning transfer, with improvements embedded into standard ways of working.
Individual: LCS Leadership Excellence Award
Louise Firby
Louise was selected for her people-focused leadership and ability to make continuous improvement feel practical, purposeful and supportive. Her submission showed a leader who brings people with her, builds trust and helps teams see improvement as something that makes their work better.
Jen Knight
Jen stood out for her leadership of Frimley Excellence and her role in embedding improvement at scale across Frimley Health. Her compassionate, coaching-led leadership has helped build capability across thousands of staff and turn Lean into part of everyday practice.
Risel Govender
Risel was selected for repositioning operational excellence as a core organisational capability rather than a standalone programme. Her leadership showed strong strategic clarity, a focus on culture and a commitment to building confidence, ownership and measurable improvement.
Eduardo Curros
Eduardo impressed the judges with his leadership in scaling GuideWell’s process improvement capability. His work helped build a structured certification, coaching and governance model that enabled hundreds of practitioners and projects across the enterprise.
Jonathan Greco
Jonathan was selected for demonstrating strong leadership in embedding improvement thinking and building momentum through others. His submission showed the behaviours judges look for in this category: direction, influence, practical delivery and a clear commitment to sustainable change.
Individual: LCS Practitioner Excellence Award
Aishwarya Chavan
Aishwarya was selected for consistently high-quality, structured improvement work across core site systems. From a digital Kaizen framework to stronger OEE data and safety improvements, her work showed rigour, follow-through and lasting operational impact.
Marta Staszewska
Marta impressed the judges with her practical, methodical and enabling approach to CI. Her work across divisions, the CI Academy and the CI Agents Network showed a practitioner who not only delivers improvement, but helps others build the confidence to do the same.
Zoe Davies
Zoe was selected for delivering major end-to-end customer journey improvements with care, structure and strong results. Her work showed a practitioner who understands both the data and the human experience, creating better outcomes for customers and colleagues.
Vicky Murray
Vicky stood out for her expert coaching and hands-on support through Frimley Excellence. Her ability to help frontline teams embed huddles, sustain improvements and build local ownership made her a strong example of practitioner excellence.
Graham Canning
Graham was selected for more than two decades of practitioner and educator impact. His work has helped organisations in multiple sectors apply Lean thinking, develop nearly 100 practitioners through LCS and deliver significant bottom-line benefits.
Individual: LCS Rising Star Award
Avinash Majji
Avinash was selected for showing strong early leadership in scaling continuous improvement capability. His work at WJEC demonstrates energy, structure and ambition, helping CI move from a specialist function into a wider organisational capability.
Josh Maddison
Josh stood out as a natural facilitator, coach and improvement specialist early in his career. His calm confidence, technical ability and willingness to jump into workshops, training and strategic reviews made him a very strong Rising Star finalist.
Issa Al Mughairi
Issa was selected for combining Lean thinking, employee experience and experiential learning in a very people-centred way. His contribution to OMRAN’s practitioner programme and engagement activity showed real promise as a future improvement leader.
Brittany Melhado
Brittan was selected for impressive early impact at GuideWell, including leading and coaching projects that saved thousands of hours. Her resilience, Lean mindset and ability to influence others made her a standout next-generation improvement leader.
Katherine Burgess
Katherine impressed the judges with her initiative, energy and measurable impact at Principality Building Society. She built Operational Excellence into the Brand & Creative team, influenced the wider function and delivered a successful voucher initiative generating over £110,000 in deposits.
Organisation: LCS Learning & Development Excellence Award
University Hospital North Midland NHS Trust
University Hospital North Midland NHS Trust was selected for its commitment to building improvement capability through learning, coaching and practical application. The submission showed a strong focus on helping people develop the confidence and skills to improve the services they work in every day.
Shared Services Connected Ltd
SSCL stood out for the scale and energy of its CI learning system. With Lean Six Sigma training, CI Month, awards, active pipelines and a strong Continuous Improvement Agency, the organisation has created a learning culture that clearly links development to real business impact.
Hilti After Market Services
Hilti After Market Services impressed with a global Lean learning approach that combines leadership enablement, local Lean champions, improvement campaigns, recognition and digital tools. The programme showed how learning can be scaled while still feeling local, practical and people-centred.
OMRAN Group
OMRAN Group was selected for its Lean Practitioner Programme, which turns learning into measurable capability. With live projects, coaching, LCS alignment and clear business results, the programme has become a real engine for OMRAN’s wider improvement journey.
Excellence.ON
Excellence.ON stood out for combining operational excellence with people development in a distinctive way. Its strengths-based approach, internal consultancy model and focus on building self-sufficiency showed a fresh and thoughtful approach to learning and capability building.
Organisation: LCS Scaling Continuous Improvement Capability Award
AirTanker with MIGSO-PCUBED
AirTanker with MIGSO-PCUBED was selected for building a practical and sustainable CI capability model. With CI champions, an ELEVATE CI Room, weekly drop-ins and clear links to strategic priorities, the submission showed improvement becoming part of normal delivery.
Nuclear Restoration Services
Nuclear Restoration Services stood out for building a thoughtful, evidence-based improvement system suited to a complex nuclear decommissioning environment. Their approach combines accredited learning, practitioner capability, leadership commitment and cross-site knowledge sharing.
City of Jacksonville
The City of Jacksonville was selected for scaling CI at pace across a major municipal organisation. With hundreds of White and Green Belts, department-based champions and a standardised Kaizen blueprint, the 904Lean initiative showed how capability can grow quickly and sustainably.
GuideWell
GuideWell impressed with the scale of its CI ecosystem across five business entities. A small core team enabled more than 260 practitioners, 400+ projects and major waste reduction, showing how strong infrastructure and coaching can create enterprise-wide capability.
Sellafield
Sellafield showed strong evidence of embedding continuous improvement beyond isolated projects and building the skills, structures and confidence needed to sustain it at scale. Their approach demonstrated how CI can become a practical organisational capability, with measurable impact and broader engagement across teams.
Congratulations to all our finalists!
The winners of the LCS Awards 2026 will be announced at the LCS Conference & Awards on 23rd September 2026 in Manchester.
Join improvement professionals from across industries to celebrate excellence in operational improvement, share best practice and recognise this year’s outstanding award winners.