There are two basic ingredients that allow an organization to effectively reach the objectives it expects from its management system; "lean and mean" - without undue detail:

The structure of the system in each of the elements that are considered vital to the success of the overall management system

The content of the management system - the activities or "elements" that are necessary to make up the management system

The structure in each element would allow the establishment of element specific objectives. This allows for periodic evaluation of results using "minimal" element content. In that way the management system could indeed be "lean and mean" based on results obtained.

When doing the cause analysis both structure and content should be considered - normally at least some content is there and an annual audit/review of the overall system, following ISO practices. But almost never is the structure present in each of the elements of the management system.

Improving the overall management system

There are two main sources for added improvement:

• Learning from accidents - improve from the things that did not go as intended. This is the reason why I made this website learningfromaccidents.com.
• Learning from audits - improve the execution and effectiveness of the management system by periodic audits. I will be making that website later this year.