In a previous post, I talked about Steven Spear’s observation about how a sensei saw a process and the problems. Jeffery Liker, Mike Hoseus and David Meier have done a good job capturing how a sensei teaches and summed it up in a diagram in the book Toyota Culture. (for those of you following at [...]
This article in Business Week offers a glimpse into some of the opportunities, and challenges, facing Russian industry, both in dealing with the global recession, and their tremendous work to get out from under the legacy of a state run economy. Two things really jump out at me. First, this particular CEO (other than the [...]
In most references describing the process of good problem solving, the first real step is to explain what actually is the problem. It is easy to get tripped up at this stage and describe the problem in terms of the desired target, or in terms of “lack of” a specific countermeasure. That, of course, skips [...]
Now and then something comes across that makes it all worth it. And nothing is more “worth it” to me than to know something I said or did contributed to someone’s insight or impetus to do something spectacular. Yesterday Earl sent me an email that is one of those times. I was going to edit [...]
Not many people know that Amazon.com is one of the “places to see” if you are looking for companies practicing the TPS. The fact that their sales and profits are hitting records as most others are scratching and clawing to stay in business is telling. This recent post by Kevin Kelleher on Gigacom really sums [...]
LEI is hosting an executive seminar with Steven Spear on June 4 in Cambridge. It looks like it is $1500. If you are a senior executive who wants to “get” what this lean stuff is really about, I would strongly encourage you to take any opportunity you can get to talk to this guy. It [...]
The Lean Enterprise Institute has recently published Kaizen Express, an overview of the classic characteristics of “lean manufacturing” and, by implication, the Toyota Production System. As I set out to review the book, I found myself heading in two directions. One is the content of the book itself. Over the years, there have been a [...]