TL;DR: In Part 2 of this interview, the late Norman Bodek explains why Lean fails when leaders cling to control. Drawing on Toyota examples and “Quick & Easy Kaizen,” he argues that long-term success comes from developing people, trusting teams,…
Welcome to the landing page for viewing and listening to podcasts that are grouped by different themes. Click here for the Lean Blog Interviews Podcast main page. Podcasts by Theme: Lean Healthcare podcasts Lean CEO podcasts Lean Enterprise Institute leaders…
Accounting teams see problems every day. As Nick Katko puts it, they fix them, but they don’t necessarily solve them. We talk about what a continuous improvement system looks like inside an accounting department, the three parts of that system,…
The kaizen board held a couple dozen sheets. Each one numbered, each one stamped “jisshi-zumi” — already done. A board full of carried-out improvements is a strong sign in any factory, in any country. But that wasn’t the part that…
Why does Lean fail to stick so often? Thomas Cox and Andre DeMerchant join me on Episode 547 to make the case that the missing precondition is psychological safety, and that it has to exist at the top before any…
Mike Stoecklein recalls a story secondhand. It was, he thinks, at one of the last four-day seminars W. Edwards Deming ever gave. Deming was frail by then. Someone later told Mike that when the seminar got to the Red Bead…
The 8 wastes of Lean are defects, overproduction, transportation, waiting, inventory, motion, overprocessing, and unused talent. The healthcare examples below show how to recognize them and investigate the processes that create them. Naming the waste is a starting point for…
TL;DR: Kaizen means “change for the better.” Everyone improves their own work, one small change at a time, using the scientific method. It’s not a suggestion box — it’s collaborative, fast, and action-oriented. Success depends on leadership engagement and psychological…
After uploading the full archive of Lean Blog Interviews transcripts into ChatGPT, I asked it to identify the ten most controversial moments. Over nearly 20 years of episodes, I’ve had the privilege of hearing guests share insights that are thoughtful,…
Each year, I take a mid-year look at what readers are finding most helpful, most shareable, and most interesting across LeanBlog.org. It’s a chance to reflect on the topics that resonated–whether Lean leadership, psychological safety, continuous improvement, or lessons from…
I wanted to share that one of my early experiments in e-book publishing is available for free on Amazon Kindle for a limited time — from now through May 25. About the Book Reflections from Lean Leaders: Transcripts from Podcast…
Today’s post is a longer and annotated version of my acceptance speech at last week’s Shingo Conference awards gala. It’s a great honor that The Mistakes That Make Us has received the 2025 Shingo Publication Award. I’d like to use…
