IndustryWeek Column

Here is the original article in question, from the Wall St Journal. The article did a little fear mongering, as the WSJ seems to do about once a year, about risks of “just in time” inventory practices.

Womack is right to point out that, even in a JIT system, that safety stocks or “emergency stocks” are required to protect against normal demand variations. For vaccines and drugs designed to protect us against bio-terror attacks, thankfully the demand for these is very “spiky”, if it’s ever going to be needed.

Here is my exclusive 5 part Q&A with Jim Womack from late 2005.

About LeanBlog.org: Mark Graban is a consultant, author, and speaker in the “lean healthcare” methodology, focused on improving quality and patient safety, improving access, reducing costs, and fully engaging healthcare professionals. He is also the Chief Improvement Officer for KaiNexus.

Tagged as: Womack