Who are the Best Lean Companies?
Here's a new feature that Amazon.com is offering, an interactive polling/ranking system. I created the list, without giving too much thought to the sequence, just to get the ball rolling. You can vote and either add new companies (scroll to the bottom of the list) (or vote to bump those on the list up or down (click the up or down arrows). I thought it might be fun to experiment with this, so check it out (if you're on RSS, you'll have to visit the Lean Blog website or click here to visit the survey on amazon). Be sure to click on "Comments" to see what others say or to chime in on why you voted the way you did.
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by Mark Graban - Permalink
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6 Comments:
Is this list companies that are implementing lean or actual Lean companies that exhibit the Toyota Production System?
It's a pretty vague question, I know. I'd say "Lean" = Toyota Production System style. For me, I'd vote Dell lower on the list because they are the Dell system, not the Toyota system.
(fixing some links that were broken in my earlier comment):
Interesting, Danaher is ahead of Toyota at the moment I'm typing this. Some companies on the list surprise me, I don't know much about them.
You might not know them either.
Is "Kion" (#12) right now "KION Group", a material handling and forktruck company? LINK
Is Darigold (#15), the dairy in Seattle? LINK
Terex (#19) is "a diversified global manufacturer of a broad range of heavy equipment for a variety of industries, including construction, infrastructure, quarrying, recycling, surface mining, shipping, transportation, refining, utility and maintenance."
LINK
Hershey (#21) surprises me since I thought I they hadn't been able to use Lean to avoid moving plants to lower-labor-cost areas LINK
Oscar Meyer (#22) -- do they use Lean?
Wiremold (#30) has plummeted in the rankings, probably because of their "updated" story on Evolving Excellence. LINK
Can anyone shed some insight? Why did you vote the way you did?
It's a real pity that companies such as Wiremold can change from an outstanding lean company named in the same instance with Toyota.
One can clearly seen that it is necessary to have a long-term vision that has to be the bold fundament of all business actions. Short term goals mustn't be achieved on the expense of the more valuable long-term goals.
Toyota is an excellent example that this is possible but it seems that it is also necessary to have strong family ties as has been at Toyota so far.
It is interesting to see -especially after just coming back from the international System Dynamics Conference in Boston- that management is not aware of the interactions in a complex system (such as a company). Small changes can really have a strong effect -with a delay mostly- in the long run.
To get a short glimpse what System Dynamics is all about here is a speech held by John Sterman, Professor for System Dynamics at MIT, during a meeting of the National Institutes of Health in March 2002 (http://videocast.nih.gov/ram/ss032207.ram).
Keep the "lean ball" rolling upwards!
Ralf
My vote is for Michigan Seat Company in Jackson, Michigan. All lean principles are applied correctly to their business.
Like the Jeffersons, Burt's Bees is moving on up.
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