Vance left a really good comment on the recent Travel Tales post. He said, in part: Having worked in the airline business, it’s really a matter of having employees that CARE (most due to their own pride, not by management) We many times had weather and mis-connected passengers to deal with. It only took a [...]
Chapter 3 of The Toyota Way to Lean Leadership is titled “Coach and Develop Others.” Where in Chapter 2 the authors were outlining the individual leader’s responsibility for self-development, now they are describing the environment and the process of supporting and focusing that drive. Rather than just outline the chapter, I want to dig into some [...]
It must be that time of the year. I see traffic in the online forums asking about how to set key performance indicators for lean staff people so their performance incentives can be set. If anyone were to ask my advice here, it comes down to one word: Don’t. Two reasons. First, we have overwhelming [...]
How many “If-Then” steps do your team members have to deal with in the course of their routine work? Every one of those branch points is a decision. It is a point where the team member must memorize decision criteria and the correct choice(s). Each “If-Then” in the process flow potentially doubles the number of [...]
Today’s Dilbert strip highlights a situation that is only funny because it happens so often: The idea that a company can focus on 25 key areas, or 125 key performance indicators (yes, I said 125 because I have seen it myself) is obviously ludicrous. Of course a manager has a legitimate concern to ensure people [...]
The introduction of The Toyota Way to Lean Leadership covers ground that: Has been covered before – we know all of this. Needs to be covered again, because most people act as though we don’t know it. Simply put, Liker and Convis (legitimately) feel the need, once again, to let us know the things which [...]
I spent last week teaching three sessions of Job Instruction. One session at the end of night shift starting at 5am, the second session catching the start of day shift at 7am, then the third session for swing shift at 1:30. What is cool, though, is there is a senior member of the site leadership [...]
Note – this post was written pretty much simultaneously with a post on the lean.org forum. Mike Rother has put up a compelling presentation that highlights a long-standing misunderstanding about the purpose of “standards.” Some time ago, a (well-meaning) author or consultant constructed a graphic that shows the PDCA wheel rolling up the incline of [...]
One of the problems facing all of us – from pundits to practitioners alike – is “too much information.” We look at a complex state, like the way Toyota operates, try do describe it in great detail, break it down, build models, and say “OK, make it look like that.” So one of the most [...]
“Resistance to change” is a common theme of discussion among practitioners on various online forums, as well as in emails I get from readers. One thing I see fairly often is that a practitioner will be suggesting a visual control or a specific application of a “lean tool” as a “better way” in the process [...]