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Mark Graban

Lean Leadership, Psychological Safety, and Continuous Improvement

Since 2005, LeanBlog.org has shared practical insights from real-world work in healthcare, manufacturing, and beyond.

Books Keynote Speaking Coaching / Advisory Podcasts
Books by Mark Graban on Lean, Leadership, and Learning (4)

Lean Blog Interviews Podcast

Podcast #147 – Scott Patten and Peter Armstrong, Founders of LeanPub.com, Part 2 on Lean Publishing

Podcast #147 – Scott Patten and Peter Armstrong, Founders of LeanPub.com, Part 2 on Lean Publishing

ByMark Graban May 15, 2012 1701
Listen Episode #147 is a part two of a conversation with  Scott Patten and Peter Armstrong from  LeanPub.com (listen to part one in episode #140). They want to be THE website for publishing...
John Toussaint, MD on Potent Medicine and Reforming Healthcare Through Lean

John Toussaint, MD on Potent Medicine and Reforming Healthcare Through Lean

ByMark Graban May 2, 2012 1760
Episode #146 is a discussion with a returning guest (#54, #62, #72), John Toussaint, MD, the CEO of the ThedaCare Center for Healthcare Value. Today, we're talking about his latest book, recently...
Podcast #145 – Interview with Natalie Sayer, Author ‘Lean for Dummies’

Podcast #145 – Interview with Natalie Sayer, Author ‘Lean for Dummies’

ByMark Graban April 25, 2012 1671
Episode #145 is a conversation with Natalie J. Sayer, co-author of the recently updated 2nd edition of the book Lean For Dummies. I was able to meet Natalie at the recent ASQ Lean and Six Sigma...
Dean Gruner on Lean Healthcare and Accountable Care Organizations at ThedaCare

Dean Gruner on Lean Healthcare and Accountable Care Organizations at ThedaCare

ByMark Graban April 16, 2012 2503
Episode #144 is a discussion with Dean Gruner, MD, the president & CEO of ThedaCare, talking about Accountable Care Organizations (ACOs) and how ThedaCare is using this approach, along with Lean...

More Blog Posts

A Better Question Than “Do You Have Any Questions?”

A Better Question Than “Do You Have Any Questions?”

Mark GrabanByMark Graban March 5, 2024 2007
Recently, I've heard an idea a few times that I'd like to share and discuss in this post. As I'm writing this, I can't remember who to cite. That's my mistake. I'll happily correct the post if I...
**Alt Text:** An image of a small chalkboard placed on a bed of multi-colored pebbles. The chalkboard has the words "Be Brave" written on it. Over the image, there is a red "No" symbol, a circle with a diagonal line through it, indicating a prohibition. In the top right corner, the Lean Blog logo is displayed, featuring a circular design with arrows in blue, green, and orange, and the text "LEAN BLOG" in the center.

Instead of Urging Your Employees to Be Brave, Help Them Feel Safe Speaking Up

Mark GrabanByMark Graban March 4, 2024 3064
Norman Bodek and Shigeo Shingo, who developed and published the poka-yoke mistake-proofing concept

Poka-Yoke and Shigeo Shingo: Why “Foolproofing” Became Mistake-Proofing

Mark GrabanByMark Graban February 28, 2024 6899

Jim Womack on Lean’s Evolution, Boeing, Toyota, and the Future of Improvement

Mark GrabanByMark Graban February 28, 2024 5653

Measures of Success Book Summary: Chapter-by-Chapter Overview

Mark GrabanByMark Graban February 26, 2024 2511

Webinars

karen martin ask the expert webinar kainexus

Ask Karen Martin Anything on Operational Excellence: A KaiNexus Webinar

March 5, 2026
Karen Martin is one of those people I've been lucky to know and learn from for a long time. She's...
1. Professor with glasses in front of EMS 20th anniversary logo and KaiNexus logo on blue background.

Unlock the Power of Leadership: A Preview of the Electrolux Manufacturing System (EMS) Webinar

December 4, 2025
KaiNexus recently hosted a webinar I was especially looking forward to: “Unlock the Power of...
Breaking Through Cultural Friction: Respect for People and Sustainable Performance

Breaking Through Cultural Friction: Respect for People and Sustainable Performance

June 9, 2025
When organizations struggle to sustain Lean transformation, people often look first at tools...
Driving a Culture of Patient Safety: Lessons for Healthcare and Beyond

Driving a Culture of Patient Safety: Lessons for Healthcare and Beyond

April 28, 2025
Recently, I had the pleasure of moderating a webinar titled “Driving a Culture of Transforming...
Why Lean Fails Without Psychological Safety

Why Lean Fails Without Psychological Safety

April 16, 2025
TL;DR: Lean tools don't fail because people resist change–they fail because people don't feel...
Preview: Driving a Culture of Accountability – Transforming Patient Safety with KaiNexus (Webinar, April 15)

Preview: Driving a Culture of Accountability – Transforming Patient Safety with KaiNexus (Webinar, April 15)

April 8, 2025
One of the most powerful elements of continuous improvement is the ability to learn from each other...
My Upcoming Webinar on Mistake-Proofing Across Industries

My Upcoming Webinar on Mistake-Proofing Across Industries

February 3, 2025
I'm excited to be presenting this webinar on February 12th at 1 pm ET as part of the KaiNexus...
Top 5 Takeaways from my KaiNexus Webinar: Psychological Safety as a Precondition for Continuous Improvement

Top 5 Takeaways from my KaiNexus Webinar: Psychological Safety as a Precondition for Continuous Improvement

January 8, 2025
TL;DR: Psychological safety isn't optional for continuous improvement. This KaiNexus webinar...
Creating Leader Standard Work (LSW) Across a Distributed Business Model — Webinar Preview

Creating Leader Standard Work (LSW) Across a Distributed Business Model — Webinar Preview

November 7, 2024
I'm happy to be hosting and moderating this webinar that will be presented by Brent Loescher, a...
Embedding Change Management into your Continuous Improvement Initiatives – Webinar Preview

Embedding Change Management into your Continuous Improvement Initiatives – Webinar Preview

September 25, 2024
I'm happy to be hosting and moderating this webinar that will be presented by Melissa Sherman, a...
View Our “Ask Us Anything” Event on Psychological Safety and Lean

View Our “Ask Us Anything” Event on Psychological Safety and Lean

August 20, 2024
Psychological safety is often described as “feeling safe to speak up.” In Lean...
From Strategy to Execution: Webinar with Karen Friedenberg

From Strategy to Execution: Webinar with Karen Friedenberg

July 17, 2024
Are you looking to transform your business strategy into actionable results? Join us for our...

Videos

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Mark Graban on YouTube

The Toyota andon cord allows a team member to signal a problem and request help without immediately stopping the production line. Pulling the cord activates a light and calls the team leader to the workstation. If the problem can be resolved before the vehicle reaches a fixed stopping point, production continues. If it cannot, that section of the line stops. This animation was AI-generated from still images taken from a Toyota video. It is a reconstructed demonstration, not original footage of the action or an official Toyota production. The andon system gives team members both the ability and the obligation to call attention to problems so the team can respond before defects continue downstream. #Andon #ToyotaProductionSystem #Lean #Kaizen #ContinuousImprovement #AIGenerated Read more about andon: https://www.leanblog.org/2012/11/andon-cords-toyota-takaota-speaking-up/
Toyota Andon Cord Explained: How It Works
When someone makes a mistake, most managers say the same thing: be more careful next time. There's a Japanese term for why that almost never works. Poka-yoke means mistake-proofing. It rests on one uncomfortable truth -- telling people to be more careful isn't a countermeasure. It's just asking them to try harder at something they were already trying at. So poka-yoke changes the question. Not "how do we get people to stop making this mistake," but "how do we design the work so this mistake is hard, or impossible, to make in the first place?" In this short: the part that only fits one way, the loom Sakichi Toyoda built before Toyota made cars, and why mistake-proofing is a more respectful idea than it first appears. More on Lean leadership, psychological safety, and continuous improvement at LeanBlog.org. #PokaYoke #MistakeProofing #Lean #ContinuousImprovement #LeanManufacturing #Leadership #Quality #OperationalExcellence #Kaizen #ProcessImprovement
"Be More Careful" Is Not a Real Countermeasure
85% of Americans avoided at least one difficult conversation in the past 30 days. Dr. Jonathan Thorp, CEO of Quantum Connections, has the survey data behind that number, and a mistake of his own that took him decades to name: he spent a career building systems that made work better, then assumed the value would be obvious to everyone else. Promoting the work felt like vanity, so he didn't. Good work kept landing as a non-event. In this episode of My Favorite Mistake with Mark Graban: 🔵 Why value is not self-evident, and what translating it actually takes 🔵 The redesigned incentive plan people mistook for a lucky run of customer calls 🔵 Why Jonathan now describes promotion as the servant of mission rather than the face of vanity 🔵 What the Quantum Connections 2026 American Dialogue Report found about avoidance, curiosity, and Gen Z 🔵 The gap between believing everyone else is closed-minded and admitting it about yourself 🔵 What naval aviation debriefs teach about candor: nobody wins with secret keeping 🔵 Why engagement, retention, and morale are downstream measures, and what sits above them 🔵 Why leaders who declare psychological safety without evidence undercut themselves Chapters (approximate): 00:00 Meet Dr. Jonathan Thorp 02:15 The mistake: thinking good work speaks for itself 05:25 Nobody actually wants the drill bit 07:52 Work as a place we tolerate 10:20 Inside the American Dialogue Report 12:37 Why 85% avoided a hard conversation 15:46 Futility, not fear 20:08 Relational health is upstream of everything 25:17 What aviation debriefs get right about candor 31:28 You can't declare psychological safety 35:21 What Gen Z is telling us About the guest: Dr. Jonathan Thorp is CEO of Quantum Connections in Dallas. He is a Naval Academy graduate in ocean engineering who spent 24 years as a naval aviator, later served as VP of organizational development at JPMorgan Chase, and has taught leadership and decision making at the Naval War College since 2010. Quantum Connections: https://quantumconnections.com/ The 2026 American Dialogue Report: https://quantumconnections.com/why-americans-avoid-difficult-conversations/ Jonathan on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jonathanthorp Full episode page, show notes, and transcript: https://markgraban.com/mistake366 Subscribe for new episodes on learning from mistakes without blame. #MyFavoriteMistake #Leadership #DifficultConversations #PsychologicalSafety #WorkplaceCulture #LearningFromMistakes
Why 85% of Us Avoid Hard Conversations | Dr. Jonathan Thorp
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