Article

How can I make sure my teams do kaizen the right way?

Dear Gemba Coach: How can I make sure my teams do kaizen the right way?

by Michael Ballé

Article

Rather than narrow problem solving, shouldn't we look for disruptive breakthroughs?

Dear Gemba Coach: How can a narrow focus on problem solving help us to find innovative solutions? Shouldn’t we be looking for disruptive breakthrough instead?

by Michael Ballé

Article

Who To Move?

Dear Gemba Coach:  "Kaizen Express" landed on my doormat this morning. While reading through I noticed that it states that if you get an operator saving…

by Michael Ballé

Article

What's the main quality I should look out for in hiring a lean coach?

Dear Gemba Coach: I’m in the process of hiring a Lean Coach for my team and I wondered if there was any one quality I…

by Michael Ballé

Article

Is there a lean way of delegating?

Dear Gemba Coach: I’m an entrepreneur and I used to micromanage everything, quite successfully. Now the firm has grown and I’m trying to delegate. How…

by Michael Ballé

Article

Ask Art: How Do We Prevent Backsliding?

Backsliding is inevitable. "The key is to anticipate the backslide and take early, aggressive, organized steps to prevent it from happening before it starts," writes…

by Art Byrne

Article

The Lab is Open

Why it's important to create a way to challenge assumptions and develop know-how, solve problems, and continuously improve--even during a crisis.

by Josh Howell

Article

Why Leadership Needs to Drive the Bus

"Lean change can start from the bottom-up, I won’t say that it can’t, but the situation needs to flip quickly to leadership so that leadership…

Article

How Menlo's Virtual Teams Are Lighting the Way Forward

While Menlo Software continues to adjust to the never-ending changes caused by COVID-19, founder Rich Sheridan takes solace that they are teeing up these challenges…

Article

Advice from the Gemba: Personal Kanbans for Lean Beginners

Kanban boards. For many of us, they were the first visual management tools we used that taught us the benefits of lean. They're simple, effective…

by Cameron DiGregorio and Kristen Gandek

Article

From Supply Chains to Value Streams

Fifteen years ago I first began to study lean supply chains, by observing Toyota’s inbound parts supply chain and later their aftermarket parts distribution system.…

by Dan Jones

Article

Public Service: Lean's Next Frontier?

John O'Donnell and Lex Schroeder share the thinking behind LEI's new Public Service Value Network and invite you to contribute to a new and fast-growing…

by Lex Schroeder

Faculty

Alan Noss

Alan received his introduction to lean when he worked for 13 years in the Service Parts Logistics Division of Toyota. He was responsible for training,…

Article

How Lean is Apple?

Apple may not worship at the altar of lean, but a close look at its operations and strategy show clear resonance with established lean principles.

by Tom Ehrenfeld

Case Study

Book Clubs Help Agricultural Company Cultivate Lean Culture

Two continuous improvement leaders explain how they successfully use book clubs to spread and align understanding of lean management at a large company with multiple…

by Chet Marchwinski

Article

How Can Lean Affect Shareholder Value?

Lean can help challenge assumptions and surface opinions that ultimately improve shareholder value, argues Michael Balle.

by Michael Ballé

Article

Standardized Work is a Goal To Work Toward, Not a Tool to Implement

Standardized work can be an ugly thing in the hands of control-oriented bureaucrats and a beautiful thing when it enables creativity and continuous improvement, says…

by Jeffrey Liker

Article

The Wonder of Level Pull

Many years ago in Toyota City I first witnessed the twin concepts of level production and the smooth pull of needed items throughout a complex…

Article

Using Lean Thinking to Help Schools Get the Resources They Need at DonorsChoose.org

A fantastic example of how lean thinking and practice has moved into the nonprofit sector, DonorsChoose.org began its lean journey in 2007 when its leadership…

by Lex Schroeder

Article

“Learning from Manufacturing” Versus Learning To Think Differently

Beau Keyte talks lean thinking and practice in non-manufacturing settings. "The big challenge now isn’t to learn lean thinking the way any other company learned…