All posts from Mark Graban’s LeanBlog.org, including podcasts, announcements, articles, and more.
Virginia Postrel Article (NY Times article Feb 2005) Here is a great example of a company using lean to compete in the furniture industry, where most everything else is moving to China (or is already there). For anyone who has ever…
Quotes from Adam Smith – Adam Smith Institute: “Consumption is the sole end and purpose of all production; and the interest of the producer ought to be attended to, only so far as it may be necessary for promoting that…
Lean Enterprise Institute Congratulations to the LEI authors. I’ve used “Making Materials Flow” in factory settings and found that it gives a very structured framework for a materials group that has never implemented kanban, proper part presentation, or delivery routes…
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Article Link Main SME Lean Link The Society for Manufacturing Engineers puts out a noteworthy “lean directions” newsletter from time to time and there are many interesting columns to be found there. In this column, though, I take issue with…
Autofieldguide.com Here is a very long article (set of articles, really) on Toyota and TPS. It includes thoughts from Taiichi Ohno, Fujio Cho, and Gary Convis. I had previously heard that the phrase “Toyota Production System” itself wasn’t created until…
Gemba Research – Blog A new article from the excellent blog at Gemba Research’s web site, talking about the Toyota 7 (8? 9? 10?) Wastes. I’ve heard some people at my company talk about an 8th waste, not fully utilizing…
IndustryWeek : Editor’s Page: A recent Conference Board survey shows: * 40% of workers feel disconnected from their employers. * two out of every three workers do not identify with or feel motivated to drive their employer’s business objectives. *…
Kennebec (ME) Journal Here is a case study of New Balance Shoes and their lean efforts. It certainly sounds like they have been able to stay competitive, in Maine, only through using lean to cut cycle times and drive improvement.…
No link to an article here, but I had to comment on a process that almost always has teh same form of waste — automated phone prompt systems. Why is it, whether it’s an airline, a bank, or an insurance…
www.mistakeproofing.com I love this website. There are 30+ examples of every day errorproofing. I wish my bank’s ATM had the error proofing function built in to the example shown. I drove off without my ATM card the other day… as…
Forbes.com: The lead of this story reads: “An influenza virus that caused the deaths of more than 1 million people in 1957 was mistakenly sent to thousands of laboratories around the world during the past six months, health officials confirmed…