All Posts on Lean Blog

Thanks as always to Ryan McCormick for this... there's always so much good reading, listening, and viewing shared here by him! News, blogs, articles, resources, and links about creating value, continuous improvement, innovation, and…
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I've updated and am republishing an old 2005 blog post that I wrote about a former GM assembly worker, Ben Hamper, who has some very funny stories in his book, Rivethead: Tales From the Assembly Line. One story, in particular, is from…
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We're coming up on the 10th anniversary of the publication of the book that I co-authored with Joe Swartz called Healthcare Kaizen: Engaging Front-Line Staff in Sustainable Continuous Improvements. I'll share more reflections about…
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This is an article that I originally published on LinkedIn back in 2015. Has the error proofing been improved since then, between credit card websites and apps? "Lean" is a business philosophy and management system that is most…
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Normally, I like to be the one doing the interviewing. My latest guest on "My Favorite Mistake" was Alisha Wielfaert, who shared her "favorite mistake" story about starting a yoga studio that failed. It's a favorite mistake because she…
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Originally posted a few years ago, I'm reposting this for the holiday here in the U.S.
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I recently saw this article in the Washington Post: This MLB season, the ball is making everyone batty Major League Baseball has been trying to reduce variation in the production of the balls that are used in games, as I've written…
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Since I host a podcast about mistakes ("My Favorite Mistake"), this is a topic I think about a lot. I hear about people's "favorite" professional mistakes and I reflect on my own. This headline naturally caught my eye last week: …
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There's currently quite the discount available on Amazon at the moment for my book (co-authored with Joe Swartz) titled The Executive Guide to Healthcare Kaizen: Leadership for a Continuously Learning and Improving Organization. The…
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I love the show "Portlandia" and I also love the "Toast Kaizen" video. I bet the latter is more well known and is more popular in my Lean circles. "Toast Kaizen" is a great intro to continuous improvement for individuals or a team.…
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Today, I'd like to share a recent blog post and a few podcasts from the Value Capture website. First off is a blog post by Ken Segel (Value Capture's CEO) about an HBR article that he wrote with Dr. John Toussaint. 4 Actions to…
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I've interviewed over 180 people over the past 18 months for my podcast series, asking them all the SAME question: "What's your favorite mistake?" Everybody makes mistakes, even the most successful people out there. A "favorite…
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