At the recent Lean Healthcare Transformation Summit, there were thought provoking presentations... and we had many discussions about the role of incremental improvement vs. redesign or transformation. And, lots of discussions about imitating vs. innovating... so I explore those themes in this post.
I’m a big nerd in that I love reading newspapers basically cover to cover. I’m a nerd in many ways, I guess. You don’t have to be a survey nerd to take my short reader survey (and you might win…
My wife and I were in Boston over the weekend, as it was her fifth reunion from her MIT master’s program. I’m also an alum, but was considered a “guest” since I graduated 16 years ago from my program and…
Our guest today is Alan G. Robinson, PhD, an award-winning author, educator, researcher and consultant. He has co-authored six books, including Modern Approaches to Manufacturing Improvement: The Shingo System, Ideas Are Free, and his latest, The Idea-Driven Organization. His specialties include managing…
Joining me for episode #187 is Joe Swartz, my friend and esteemed co-author of our books Healthcare Kaizen: Engaging Front-Line Staff in Sustainable Continuous Improvements and The Executive Guide to Healthcare Kaizen: Leadership for a Continuously Learning and Improving Organization.…
It’s been eight years since I launched my blog… January 2005. Then it was “Lean Manufacturing Blog” at the kanban.blogspot.com address… it’s now “LeanBlog.org” as things have evolved in both the site’s design and content. My primary interests have shifted…
Episode #142 brings us a returning guest (#115), Eric Ries, author of the best-selling book The Lean Startup: How Today’s Entrepreneurs Use Continuous Innovation to Create Radically Successful Businesses. In the book, Eric cites the work of Taiichi Ohno, including the “5…
Hat tip to John Shook and the Lean Enterprise Institute for pointing this out via his email newsletter — today would have been the 100th birthday of Taiichi Ohno, usually credited as one of the creators of the Toyota Production…
Today, I’m linking to a post from a new blog written by the Ohio State University Fisher College of Business (“Think Op-Ex“). The post “What’s in a name?” features thoughts from James Hereford, formerly of Group Health (part of the…
As I’ve been working on my upcoming second book, Healthcare Kaizen: Engaging Front-Line Staff in Sustainable Improvements, I’ve had “kaizen” (or continuous improvement) on the brain even more than usual. One distinction between kaizen ideas and a traditional “suggestion system” is…
I had an amazing conversation on Saturday with Paul Akers (pictured at left), the founder and president of FastCap, a company in Washington, a former Republican candidate for the U.S. Senate seat, and the host of “The American Innovator” radio…
I’m here at the Shingo Prize conference for the second year in a row. Lots of good networking and talks I’ll share a few quotes and highlights, along with a picture of my friend and sometimes guest blogger, Adam Zak.…
