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The Independent Double Check and the Risk of Human Error What 21,050 Clinicians Told Us About Fear and Futility
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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

Elisabeth Swan on The Problems With Brainstorming and Why “Structure Sets You Free”

Elisabeth Swan on The Problems With Brainstorming and Why “Structure Sets You Free”

ByMark Graban October 20, 2020 1402
My guest for Episode #389 is Elisabeth Swan. She is the co-author of The Problem-Solver's Toolkit and co-host of the Just-in-Time Cafe Podcast. As her bio says, she's “been helping people...
Kata, Crises, and Michael Lombard’s Innovative AME Conference Keynote

Kata, Crises, and Michael Lombard’s Innovative AME Conference Keynote

ByMark Graban October 13, 2020 1981
My guest for Episode #388 is my friend Michael Lombard. I first met Michael when he lived in the DFW area and first got into healthcare. He has been a Lean facilitator / coach in numerous healthcare...
Seán Paul Teeling on Lean Healthcare and Covid-19 Treatment in Ireland

Seán Paul Teeling on Lean Healthcare and Covid-19 Treatment in Ireland

ByMark Graban October 4, 2020 2077
My guest for Episode #387 of the podcast is Seán Paul Teeling, who joins us from Dublin, Ireland. He is the Programme Director for the Professional Certificate and Graduate Diploma in Lean Healthcare...
Steve Spear on Lessons from Hajime Oba: How Toyota’s Legendary Teacher Looked at Systems and Learning

Steve Spear on Lessons from Hajime Oba: How Toyota’s Legendary Teacher Looked at Systems and Learning

ByMark Graban September 29, 2020 3282
Steve Spear shares lessons from Hajime Oba, who founded Toyota's Supplier Support Center (TSSC) and became one of the most influential teachers of the Toyota Production System in North America. In...

More Blog Posts

Why Psychological Safety Is Essential to Quality and Continuous Improvement

Why Psychological Safety Is Essential to Quality and Continuous Improvement

Mark GrabanByMark Graban October 22, 2025 9675
In this special bonus episode, Mark Graban and C.J. Kaufman preview the ASQ Cincinnati-Dayton 2025 conference and explore why quality, leadership, and psychological safety are inseparable foundations...

Ryan McCormack’s Operational Excellence Mixtape: October 17, 2025

Ryan McCormackByRyan McCormack October 17, 2025 4876

How a Pharmacist-Led Kaizen Improved Cardiac Care and Reduced Costs by $90,000 a Year

Mark GrabanByMark Graban October 16, 2025 1201

Why Caring Cultures Matter in Lean: Psychological Safety, Respect for People, and Sustainable Improvement

Mark GrabanByMark Graban October 15, 2025 2634

Healthcare Cost Pressures Are Real — But the Cost of Patient Harm Is Higher

Mark GrabanByMark Graban October 14, 2025 1261

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

Preview of the KaiNexus iPhone App – making improvement easier, anywhere

Preview of the KaiNexus iPhone App – making improvement easier, anywhere

ByMark Graban March 6, 2012 Comments (5) 1036
KaiNexus has an initial v 1.0 iPhone app that's about ready to be submitted to Apple! It's been an...
parks and rec mouth on spout

An Elegant Solution by Subtraction (From “Parks & Recreation”)

ByMark Graban March 4, 2012 Comment (0) 3909
Our good friend Matt May (see posts and podcasts about him here) has a new book coming out in...
Paul Akers Q&A On Incentives & Rewards for Kaizen

Paul Akers Q&A On Incentives & Rewards for Kaizen

ByMark Graban February 6, 2012 Comments (7) 2277
It's time for another reader question – this time, it was a question that came in via Twitter...

Mark Graban on YouTube

Eric Dingler paused a weekly numbers meeting with his wife for six weeks. It became a year, and a cash-flow gap grew into debt he kept to himself. Eric, author of Hire to Grow, was running two businesses remotely while his family traveled full time through 20 countries. Without the weekly check-in, losing a client led to a short draw on a line of credit, then another, then one that never got repaid. Embarrassed, he held off telling his wife until he could also show her a way out. Meanwhile he launched a string of new offers that confused clients and his email list. He explains what was driving that silence, what changed after he told her, and how the same pattern shows up when owners hold on to work they should be handing off. What you'll learn: 🔵 Why pausing a routine accountability meeting can remove the check that catches both bad ideas and bad numbers 🔵 How a small line-of-credit draw snowballed when no one else was looking at the numbers 🔵 Eric's "significance, acceptance, and security" explanation for why people hide mistakes, even from someone who has never given them a reason to fear the reaction 🔵 Why testing ideas with bullets before cannonballs broke down once he started launching out of panic 🔵 The difference between training a team and developing one, and how that let Eric go 10 days in the Amazon without checking in 🔵 The 10/10/80 approach to using the hours a first hire frees up 🔵 Why Eric has committed that no one on his team will lose their job to AI 🔵 The first step for an owner who suspects they're the bottleneck: an honest time audit Chapters (approximate): 00:00 Meet Eric Dingler 02:05 The paused weekly meeting 06:05 Panic launches vs. small tests 10:34 Significance, acceptance, and security 14:38 Training vs. developing your team 19:35 Hiring before you feel ready 23:25 AI and a people-first team 34:48 Healthcare as a digital nomad 38:36 First step: an honest time audit Eric Dingler is a business coach and the owner of In Transit Studios, a digital marketing agency. He helps small business owners build teams that can run without them in the day-to-day. Hire to Grow: Make Your Next Hire Pay for Themself in 30 Days: https://link.amazon/B0cccpPQF (affiliate link) Website: https://ericdingler.com LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/ericdingler/ Episode page, show notes, and full transcript: https://markgraban.com/mistake368 Subscribe to My Favorite Mistake for more conversations with leaders about the mistakes that changed how they work. #MyFavoriteMistake #Leadership #SmallBusiness #Hiring #Delegation #PsychologicalSafety #DigitalNomad
The Accountability Meeting He Stopped Having | Eric Dingler
Strategy deployment -- hoshin kanri -- is supposed to work like a game of catch. Goals flow down from leadership, ideas and feedback flow back up from the people doing the work, and both sides adjust. The ball goes back and forth. A lot of organizations are playing dodgeball instead. The ball only goes one direction, it's thrown hard, and the people on the receiving end are just trying not to get hit. The cost isn't the meeting time you save by skipping the conversation. It's the year you lose executing against metrics that don't match the work. In this short, I share what happened when a hospital cascaded a patient falls target to a labor and delivery unit whose patients don't fall -- and the dashboard that would have looked perfect while the real risks went unmeasured. More on Lean leadership, psychological safety, and continuous improvement at LeanBlog.org. #StrategyDeployment #HoshinKanri #Lean #LeanLeadership #ContinuousImprovement #Leadership #CatchBall #OperationalExcellence #Kaizen #ProcessImprovement
Catch Ball or Dodgeball? How Goals Really Flow
An ICU nurse was asked to run a hospital laboratory she knew nothing about, right as consultants arrived to cut costs. Four months in, she was sure saying yes had been a mistake. Stephanie Mitchell explains what changed her mind, and what she learned about leading people whose work you could never do yourself. 🔵 Why leading experts starts with admitting you are not one 🔵 What separates real cost reduction from an across-the-board 10 percent cut 🔵 Why a written no-layoff commitment was a condition of the consulting contract 🔵 How faster lab turnaround times helped the hospital avoid building an ER expansion 🔵 The five separate checks that stop one human error from reaching a patient 🔵 What David Mann meant by embracing a mistake instead of looking away from it 🔵 Why the people who never ask questions were the ones she worried about Chapters (approximate, pending verification against the published video): 00:00 Meeting again 20 years later 01:43 The favorite mistake: saying yes to the lab 05:01 Leading people who know more than you 09:48 Cutting costs the right way 13:54 The no-layoff promise 16:52 Turnaround times and the ER expansion they skipped 21:15 Convincing a skeptical CEO 24:35 Building the lean team 28:34 Five checks in the blood bank 33:18 Embracing the mistake Stephanie Mitchell, RN, BSN, MBA, retired as Director of Lean Process Improvement and Laboratory Services at Riverside Medical Center in Kankakee, Illinois, where she led the laboratory for 20 years. Full episode page: https://markgraban.com/mistake367 Host Mark Graban is a consultant, speaker, and the author of The Mistakes That Make Us. Subscribe for new episodes of My Favorite Mistake every week. #MyFavoriteMistake #Leadership #Healthcare #Lean #ContinuousImprovement #PsychologicalSafety
They Asked a Nurse to Run the Hospital Lab | Stephanie Mitchell
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