Mark's note: Today's post is by David Meier, a former Toyota group leader, and co-author of the excellent books The Toyota Way Fieldbook
David is answering the question: “How does standardized work apply to leaders?”
Why People Misunderstand Standardized Work
What we can say with confidence is that people naturally skim new topics and quickly form hypotheses based on limited information. In the case of standardized work, many people see or read about someone performing a repetitive task–such as work on an assembly line–combined with the phrase “standardized work,” and they draw incorrect conclusions about what standardized work really means.
This snap association is not laziness; it's how our brains cope with overwhelming amounts of information.
How Our Brains Create Shortcuts
Humans, like all living organisms, must obey the laws of thermodynamics–especially the conservation of energy. Our brains make up roughly 5% of our body mass but consume nearly 20% of our energy, even in “economy mode.”
Over millennia, we've evolved shortcuts to manage cognitive load. One of the most important is compartmentalization.
Compartmentalization allows us to make quick associations and gloss over nuance. Numerous studies demonstrate this effect. A classic example is the “switching person” experiment.
In this experiment, a participant begins a transaction (for example, at a hotel desk). Mid-interaction, the clerk ducks behind the desk and a completely different person pops up to finish the transaction. Roughly 80% of participants never notice the switch. They may remember glasses, height, or gender–but miss the fact that the person changed entirely.
This tells us something important: people miss more than they realize, even when the differences are significant.
Why Standardized Work Gets Dismissed Too Quickly
Given this tendency, it's predictable that many people conclude standardized work applies only to repetitive, cyclical tasks. They say things like:
“My work isn't repetitive, so standardized work doesn't apply to me.”
This belief is especially common among leaders and professionals whose work does not follow a visible cycle. Unfortunately, this conclusion is based on a shallow interpretation of what standardized work actually is.
Standardized Work Is Philosophy, Not Just a Tool
One challenge is that standardized work operates on three levels at once:
- Philosophical – a belief about how to achieve better results
- Conceptual – a way of thinking about work
- Tactical – specific practices and methods
There is no single “correct” format or definition of standardized work. It is not a rigid checklist. It is a conceptual framework for understanding work and improving it.
This flexibility is both a strength and a source of frustration. People often want a single “right way,” but standardized work resists that kind of certainty.
The Real Purpose: Making Problems Visible
At its core, standardized work exists for one primary reason: to make problems visible.
Any problem requires a reference point–an understanding of how something is supposed to be done. That reference point is a standard. Without it, deviations blend into the background and go unnoticed.
Standardized work provides a baseline so we can compare actual performance to intended performance and recognize when something is off.
A Critical Caution: Don't Over-Standardize
Here's the important nuance: everything is imperfect. Technically, everything could be considered a problem–but clearly, not everything can or should be fixed.
If you try to standardize everything, you will overwhelm the organization and hide what truly matters. Standards should focus on areas of meaningful risk, not trivial variation.
Over-standardization creates noise. Good standardization creates clarity.
The Trap of Absolute Thinking
Another human limitation is our tendency toward binary thinking:
- Either everything can be standardized…
- …or nothing can, so why bother?
Neither is true.
Humans are also notoriously bad at assessing risk, especially when consequences are distant, abstract, or delayed. We are good at responding to immediate danger–but much worse at evaluating slow-burn risks.
When I ask groups what percentage of their work is “critical,” I often hear answers like 80% or more–usually without anyone asking what “critical” actually means.
What “Critical” Really Means
By definition, a task is critical when:
- A small deviation from a known standard
- Leads to a known problem
- With a significant consequence
When people apply this definition honestly, the percentage of truly critical work is often closer to 5-10%, sometimes less.
Many tasks are important. Some matter very little. This aligns with the Pareto principle–a small number of activities account for most of the risk and impact.
Why This Analysis Is So Hard
Analyzing work this carefully requires effort–and our brains are designed to avoid unnecessary effort.
You could even argue that this tendency was once a survival advantage. Those who conserved energy were more likely to survive famine. So when people “don't think deeply,” it's not a moral failure–it's biology.
Standardized Work Is Never “Done”
Another misconception is treating Lean elements as a checklist:
Go. Do. Check the box. Move on.
Standardized work is not a one-time task. It is iterative:
- Identify the most critical elements
- Standardize those
- Stabilize performance
- Move to the next most critical items
This is the essence of continuous improvement.
What This Means for Leaders
A leader's work is not fully cyclical–but elements of it are. Some of those elements matter greatly and deserve a defined process for how, when, and where decisions are made.
We don't want operators “winging it” on the shop floor. So why would we want leaders relying purely on “best judgment” with no shared framework?
At Toyota, this was described as “leveling up”–developing consistent judgment across leaders by clarifying decision factors, setting expectations, and reviewing outcomes.
Standard Work Is a Plan, Not a Straitjacket
Leaders often resist standardized work out of fear:
“What if I don't follow it exactly?”
But failure to follow a standard is not a fault. It is the desired signal. A deviation tells us something important:
- Was the deviation expected?
- Was the standard unrealistic?
- Did the system fail?
Standardized work exists in a no-blame environment. It is a learning tool, not a weapon.
Standardization Allows Flexibility
Not everything is defined to the nth degree. Some standards include decision trees or if/then logic. The presence of choice does not mean the work is not standardized.
Many roles–material handlers, maintenance staff, administrators–do not repeat the same task endlessly. Yet standards still exist. They simply apply conditionally.
The Only Honest Answer: “It Depends”
When I asked Toyota trainers how to standardize non-repetitive work, they always answered the same way:
“It depends.”
Meaning: think carefully, decide what matters, test it, and learn.
There is no silver bullet. Lean is not magic. It is a disciplined cycle of:
think –> act –> evaluate –> adjust
That's all it has ever been.
Great job pointing out how critical creating standard work is to PDCA.
Great explanation. We tend to learn more from what doesn’t go well [failure] that what does go well. My mentor, John Maxwell, refers to it as failing forward. The real gold is within the learning process of adapting to change which drives continuous reflection, awareness and new opportunities to improve. Right on the target of doing more of the good or adjusting and moving towards good which is what the lean (continuous improvement) stuff is all about.