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In The News

  • Becoming Horizontal in a Vertical World

    Inside Quality Insider, the web magazine of Quality Digest, re-publishes an e-letter from LEI Founder and Chairman Jim Womack on the role and main responsibility of the lean manager.

  • Factory Efficiency Comes to the Hospital

    A front page article on lean healthcare in the Sunday New York Times business section quoted LEI Senior Fellow Mark Graban on the challenges of culture change. The main focus of the article was Seattle Children's Hospital, a member of the Healthcare Value Leaders Network. Three other network members were cited.

  • Lean Problem Solving and A3 Expert Interviewed on Business901

    "If you develop the [problem-solving] thought process of your workforce then you're tapping into a potential that many companies ignore," said Tracey Richardson, a faculty member at the Lean Enterprise Institute and a former Toyota manager. Tracey made her remarks during a recent Business 901 podcast series on lean implementation issues.

    "The responsibility for developing people's problem-solving thought processes is yours as a manager or executive," she said. Tracey, who teaches a Lean Problem Solving workshop, offered several practical tips that you can use to develop people as problem-solvers.

    Hear them at:
    http://business901.com/blog1/problem-solving-really-the-core-of-lean-implementation/ 

  • THE END OF THE LINE FOR GM-TOYOTA JOINT VENTURE

    LEI Founder and Chairman Jim Womack and Senior Advisor John Shook are among the key experts interviewed for this look at the success of the Toyota-GM joint venture and what prevented GM from quickly deploying lessons that may have prevented bankruptcy.  ("All Things Considered," March 26, 2010.)

  • NUMMI: This American Life

    LEI Founder and Chairman Jim Womack and Senior Advisor John Shook are among the key experts interviewed for this one-hour look at the success of the Toyota-GM joint venture and what prevented GM from quickly deploying lessons that may have prevented bankruptcy.  ("This American Life" on National Public Radio, March 27, 2010) Note: A transcript of a shorter version of the story that aired on NPR's "All Things Considered" is available: http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=125229157 

  • Can the Toyota Way survive Toyota's ways?

    Lean Enterprise Institute Founder Jim Womack along with other Lean Thinkers and analysts comment on Toyota's quality crisis and the way forward for the lean management movement. (Posted at Fortune.com)

  • Rapid Growth Has Its Perils, Toyota Learns

    Toyota's rapid growth from 2002 to 2010 garnered it 15% of the global auto industry, surpassing General Motors as the world’s largest carmaker, but growth may have cost the automaker its reputation for quality as it extended to Europe the recall of vehicles with faulty accelerators. “There was always a question about how fast they could go,” James P. Womack, an author and expert on Toyota’s manufacturing methods, said of the automaker’s growth. “I’m sure they regret that they stomped on the gas so hard.” (The New York Times)

  • Ipbüken: Turkey Should Adopt Lean Methods and Focus on Exports
    A conference organized by the Lean Institute Turkey (Yalin Enstitu Dernegi), an affiliate of the nonprofit Lean Enterprise Institute, featured presentations by Toyota Engineering Corporation (TEC) CEO Toshio Horikiri and executives from Turkey's leading companies, including Orhan Holding, Uzel Machine Industry, Hugo Boss Textile, May Seed Company, TOFA Inc., and Goodyear Tire Company. All addressed successful lean applications in Turkey. The first day of the conference addressed issues relevant to the textile, agriculture and automotive sectors. The second day concentrated on applying lean principles to healthcare. "Considering the significance of the healthcare system and its problems in Turkey, the conference is expected to help this sector," said Institute Founder Yalcin Ipbuken. (Published by Today's Zaman, Dec. 3, 2007.)
  • Executives Urged to Do “Lean Math” to Calculate the True Cost of Offshoring
    Keynoting the annual conference of the Institute of Industrial Engineers, management expert James Womack, Ph.D., said senior managers should use “lean math” to calculate the true total cost of offshoring. "Lean math" and  groundbreaking ideas for implementing lean principles in retail, air travel, and healthcare are explained in Lean Solutions, co-authored by Womack and Dan Jones.
  • Machine That Changed the World Named to Executive Reading List in The New York Times
    The classic management book The Machine That Changed the World, which was recently reissued in paperback, has been named to an executive reading list compiled by The New York Times.
  • From Lean Tools to Lean Management
    LEI Founder and Chairman James Womack describes three elements for moving companies beyond the application of lean tools, such as kaizen events, to lean management, based on the scientific approach of plan, do, check, act. Lean management is the successor to the previously dominant mass production approach to management as perfected by Alfred Sloan at General Motors in the 1920s. Now, Womack says, he sees signs that senior managers are beginning to realize that they need to think more about lean management.
  • Just in Time, Just in Case, and Just Plain Wrong
    Do lean just-in-time (JIT) inventories make supply chains more vulnerable in a world worried about disruptions from pandemics? Jim Womack sets the record straight in Just in Time, Just in Case, and Just Plain Wrong.
  • The Lean Way Forward at Ford
    Lean Enterprise Institute Chairman and Founder, James Womack offers his views on the recent events at Ford.
  • Nonsense About JIT
    Do lean just-in-time (JIT) inventories make supply chains more vulnerable in a world worried about disruptions from terrorism? Read Jim Womack's insights in Nonsense About JIT.
  • Move Your Operations to China? Do Some Lean Math First
    A hard look at the true cost of moving operations out of high-wage countries often shows that relocation is not the first line of defense, notes LEI Founder and President James Womack. Rather, as "lean math" demonstrates, it's to get truly serious about a lean transformation through the entire value stream for the product in question.
  • Why Tesco is Winning: Lean Provision, based on Lean Production Principles, Helps Retailer Tesco Best Wal-Mart
    Learn more about how the principles of lean production have been extended to the process of consumption by British retailer Tesco, which is competing successfully against Wal-Mart in Europe and Asia and plans to open small stores on the U.S. West coast. (In-depth: read a book excerpt about Tesco's lean approach to retail; then read an excerpt about how lean production principles are being extended through the entire provision process and through consumption.Get an overview of lean consumption here.)
  • Why Toyota Won
    GM and Ford don't need new car models; they need a new business model, says LEI President Jim Womack in this Wall Street Journal op ed.
  • Mr. Ford's Wrong Turn
    Read Jim Womack's rebuttal in The Washington Post to Bill Ford's claim that automakers need government help.
  • A Tale of Two Business Systems
    At its root, the crisis buffeting Ford and GM is not due to too many retirees, too-high healthcare costs, or too-high energy prices. The root cause of the crisis is a clash between two very different business systems, and the better system is winning, according to James Womack, president and founder of the Lean Enterprise Institute.
  • Work Force 2006 Conference: Lean Thinking Works Everywhere!
    Jim Womack's keynote address at the Jan. 10 Work Force Summit in Jacksonville, FL, a regional conference on workforce trends.
  • Lean Consumption
    "Lean Consumption," the lead article in the March issue of the Harvard Business Review, is “a landmark synthesis of ideas whose implications haven’t been fully understood and a breakthrough to new territory,” according to Editor Tom Stewart. In this letter to the Lean Community, co-author Jim Womack, president and founder of the Lean Enterprise Institute, outlines the concepts in the article, which previews the book on the same subject that will be printed in the fall of 2005. Get a copy of the HBR Lean Consumption article.
  • What Is the Lean Enterprise Institute (LEI)?
    A summary of lean managment and the Lean Enterprise Institute's background and mission.
  • What Is Lean Thinking?
    Lean Thinking is the title of a landmark book by James Womack and Daniel Jones that explains the set of ideas known as lean thinking or lean production. The book explains the thought process underpinning a complete lean system, gives examples of successful lean transformations, and provides an Action Plan for implementation.
  • Capsule Definitions of Key Lean Concepts
    Succinct summaries of some critical lean concepts.
  • Example of a current-state map
    A current-state map shows the path of a product or service from order to delivery to determine the current conditions. (Source: Learning to See, Lean Enterprise Institute, 1999.)
  • Example of a future-state map
    A future-state map deploys the opportunities for improvement identified in the current-state map to achieve a higher level of performance.(Source: Learning to See, Lean Enterprise Institute, 1999.)
  • Lean Accounting Summit Presentation with Updated Slides
    Here is James Womack's presentation at the Lean Accounting Summit with updated slides.
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