If you’re reading via RSS, that’s great, I support free full-text RSS feeds for my readers (over 800 now via RSS, compared to about 500 who visit the website).

One thing you’re probably missing out on, unless you do visit the website once in a while, are some of the informative and insightful comments left by the readers. Here are some of the best… come take a look and participate yourself, even. I like the Blog to be a two-way discussion, so come chime in.

• My post about the WSJ bashing “just in time” after the Japan earthquake brought many good comments including:
• Joe asked (in part): “What is the alternative, accept higher costs and worse quality just to buffer yourself from a 6.8 earthquake?”
• Matthew May left a very long comment giving some first hand insight into Toyota’s past reactions to situations like this
• I included text of the letter I sent to the WSJ editors

• My post about the Art Smalley webcast got a helpful response giving the link to the archived presentation (thanks, Brad at Industry Week)
• My post asking if the NHS sending a large group to Japan to visit Lean factories was a “boondoggle” and if they should have just found lean factories in the UK (including Toyota) got many responses, including a comment from Jon Miller constructively defending the practice.
• My post on Starbucks, market pricing, and cost stirred (pun intended) some debate between myself and Ron Pereira and also got an explanation from Jon Miller again, publisher of the Ohno book Ron and I were discussing.

Thanks to my all of excellent commenters and for the value you add to the Lean Blog!

p.s. for the RSS readers… technical note, I’m trying to figure out how to incorporate a “Comments Count” tag at the bottom of each post in the RSS feed. It’s a technical issue with Feedburner. I also have a separate RSS feed for the Comments, check it out in the upper left corner of the page or click here.

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.