One of the more famous tools taught by Chihiro Nakao of Shingijutsu fame is to direct the learner to observe an operation and “sketch the flows.” Another Time Ideas article by Anne Murphy Paul, How to Increase Your Powers of Observation, validates Nakao’s instinct. She makes the distinction between casual observation that we all do, [...]
PC once again left a provocative post in the Lean Thinker’s Community, and gave us a link to this Tim Harford TED talk that drives home the point that learning and improvement is more about rapidly discovering things that don’t work than about designing things that do. Trial and Error Tom Wujec makes the same [...]
I am taking the Toyota Kata seminar this week in Ann Arbor. There are two programs offered: A one-day classroom overview of the concepts in Toyota Kata. The one-day classroom overview followed by two days of practice on a shop floor, for a total of three days. I am taking the three day version. Impressions [...]
This post rambles a bit, and wraps up a few concepts. It was, however, inspired by a recent interview of Mike Rother on Lean Nation. (See below) One of the many good points that struck me was that you can’t rally around an ROI. Yet companies try to do just that. They set something ROI [...]
On Monday MIT hosted a webinar with Steven Spear on the topic of “Creative Experimentation.” A key theme woven throughout Spear’s work is the world today is orders of magnitude more complex than it was even 10 or 15 years ago. Where, in the past, it was feasible for a single person or small group [...]
Mike Rother and Bill Costantino have shared a presentation titled “Toyota Kata Unified Field Theory.” I think it nicely packages a number of concepts in an easy-to-understand flow. I want to expand on a couple of points but first listen to the presentation. (Yes, it has a sound track, to be sure to hit the “Play” [...]
I have been touting Chip and Dan Heath’s book Switch for some time now, so it I thought I ought to actually write about why. If you are in the role of a “change agent” this book is your manual. Up to this point, the bible for “organizational change” has been John P. Kotter’s book [...]
This sketchcast from Dan Pink covers the same ground as his TED talk that I posted a few weeks ago, but it is more succinct and direct so I wanted to share it. When we look at what drives kaizen and continuous improvement, it is important to understand what motivates people to find a better [...]
Mike Rother shared an overview presentation on the “Improvement Kata.” Introduction to the Improvement Kata View more presentations from Mike Rother. The words on one graphic really jumped out at me: Aside from his intended point that you never get good at anything but “business as usual” if “business as usual” is what you [...]
In a recent blog post, Why C level executives don’t engage in ‘lean’…, Steven Spear makes a really interesting observation. He cites two main reasons. 1) “Lean” is regarded as a tool kit. There has already been a lot written here, and elsewhere, on this fallacy and how it continues to be propagated. Spear’s most [...]