Joe Swartz and I are building upon our well-received (and Shingo Research Award winning) book Healthcare Kaizen with a new special edition aimed at busy senior leaders. The book is available for pre-order now at Amazon.com: The Executive Guide to Healthcare Kaizen: Leadership for a Continuously Learning and Improving Organization.
We've had readers, say an internal Lean consultant or process improvement director at a hospital, say that the book is great, but it's too much (and, again, too heavy) to give to a CEO or senior leader to read on a flight.
Joe and I gave that a lot of thought and our publisher agreed with us that we could do a special edition (technically a new book) and keep Healthcare Kaizen on the market, of course.
Starting with that customer need, I benchmarked two popular healthcare books, namely Dr. John Toussaint's two excellent books On the Mend and Potent Medicine. Those books are smaller and lighter (even as hardcover books). Based on the smaller page size and number of pages, we used that as the vision for The Executive Guide to Healthcare Kaizen.
We worked backward to prioritize the content that would be most useful to time-crunched senior leaders. We included some material from Healthcare Kaizen, re-wrote some material to be aimed at senior leaders, AND wrote some new material especially for them, including Chapter 1 material on “why Kaizen?” and more about the ROI of a Kaizen program (which includes more than just financial results). We've also left out some of the “how to” detail, while focusing more on the role of leaders in creating a culture of continuous improvement. The Executive Guide also has just a handful of real Kaizen examples, compared to over 100 in the larger book.
You can download a free PDF file that includes:
- Chapter 1 of the new book
- A comparison of the two books
- Detailed table of contents for The Executive Guide
- 20% discount codes to be used when ordering any of my books through the publisher, Productivity Press.
Click here to register to receive the PDF immediately via email.
Some tables that show comparisons of the two books… we hope the difference between the two books is clear as this is something we want to be careful about in our marketing. We hope that The Executive Guide, being a less expensive book (currently $22 at Amazon) will help introduce new audiences to the power of the Kaizen improvement methodology. We can imagine a healthcare organization buying many copies of The Executive Guide and then having one (or a handful) of the larger Healthcare Kaizen book with all of its examples to be shared and passed around.
| Chapter | Healthcare Kaizen | Chapter | The Executive Guide |
| Front Material | Norm Bodek & Masaaki Imai | Gary Kaplan, MD & Masaaki Imai | |
| 1 | Kaizen & CI | 1 | The Need for Kaizen |
| 2 | Roots of Kaizen | 2 | What is Kaizen |
| 3 | Types of Kaizen | 3 | Types of Kaizen |
| 4 | Kaizen Culture | 4 | Kaizen Culture |
| 5 | Quick & Easy Kaizen | 5 | Daily Kaizen Methods |
| 6 | Idea Boards | ||
| 7 | Sharing Kaizen | ||
| 8 | Art of Kaizen | 6 | Role of Senior Leaders |
| 9 | Role of Leaders | 7 | Role of Other Leaders |
| 10 | Org-Wide Kaizen | 8 | Org-Wide Kaizen |
| 11 | Lean Methods for Kaizen | ||
| 12 | Kaizen at Home | ||
| 13 | Conclusion | 9 | Conclusion |
| Healthcare Kaizen | The Executive Guide | |
| Format | 8.5×11 paperback | ~6×9 paperback |
| Paper | Glossy | Plain |
| Color | Full-color | B&W |
| Figures | ~200 | ~15 |
| Kaizen Examples | 100 | 8 |
| Pages | 400 | 200 |
| Target Audience | All healthcare (trying to appeal to front-line and managers to a large extent) | C-level & BoardSenior LeadersVPsDirectors |
| Cost | $59.95 | $29.95 |
The description of the book from Amazon:
Some healthcare organizations have learned about daily kaizen, but they struggle to move from platitudes to practical action. The Executive Guide to Healthcare Kaizen is an introduction to kaizen principles and an overview of the leadership behaviors and mindsets required to create a kaizen culture or a culture of continuous improvement. It is specifically written for senior leaders and managers who need to understand the power of this useful Lean methodology. These are the executives and senior-level managers who need to inspire and motivate their organization–leadership which is critical in sustaining improvement and moving their organization into the future.
The book contains a new introduction by Gary Kaplan, MD, the CEO of Virginia Mason Medical Center in Seattle, Washington.
The Executive Guide to Healthcare Kaizen is a companion book to Healthcare Kaizen: Engaging Front-Line Staff in Sustainable Continuous Improvements. Healthcare Kaizen is a longer, more complete “how to” guide that includes over 200 full color images, including over 100 real kaizen examples from various health systems around the world.
Curious to hear your thoughts and feedback…
If you’re working to build a culture where people feel safe to speak up, solve problems, and improve every day, I’d be glad to help. Let’s talk about how to strengthen Psychological Safety and Continuous Improvement in your organization.
