A Good Quote (from 1882!)

I'm prepping for a presentation I'm giving next week on Lean leadership styles and I ran across tihs great quote that John Shook shared at his presentation at the Global Lean Healthcare Summit earlier this year. I wanted to share it:

“It is a mistake to suppose that men succeed through success; they much oftener succeed through failures. Precept, study, advice, and example could never have taught them so well as failure has done.”

The quote is from Samuel Smiles, the British author of the book “Self Help” and Shook says his 1880's writings were a favorite of Sakichi Toyoda.

If you're struggling with the idea of “how do we learn about Lean?” Reading helps, but you have to go and try something. Run experiments, learn from your experiences. Hopefully, you work in an environment were “smart failures” are OK. Have a great weekend.