Monday is Labor Day, a holiday in the United States. Since one of the main pillars of the Toyota Production System is “respect for people,” let’s revisit previous Lean Blog posts that focus on that concept (click on the “Respect for People” tag at the bottom of the post).

I learned, very early in my career, that a company’s problems aren’t likely the result of “lazy” employees who “don’t care” about the business at hand. Leadership has a responsibility to have the right management system in place.

Henry Ford once said something to the effect of, “Workers will work under any system.” Instead of blaming workers for our problems, let’s put the right type of Lean leadership in place and let’s turn “workers” into “thinkers” of the “Thinking Production System.”‘

Happy Labor Day, everyone.

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: Respect for People