Jay Hodge taught the Toyota Production System at a General Motors stamping plant in Indiana — then got a call from Toyota asking him to come work for them. In this episode, he shares what he learned about lean culture,…
Joining me for Episode #397 is Hide Oba. His father was the late Hajime Oba, famous for his work at Toyota and the TSSC, as Steve Spear and I discussed back in Episode #386. Hide worked with his father at…
t;dr: A visit to Toyota’s North American headquarters offered more than a virtual plant tour. It revealed how Toyota blends the Toyota Production System, Lean leadership, and learning from crisis to build trust, improve communication, and continuously improve–inside and outside…
tl;dr: Toyota’s long-term success comes from treating Lean as a people development system, not a toolbox. By prioritizing learning, coaching, and growth over short-term results, Toyota builds stronger capabilities–and better outcomes–over time. When most organizations talk about Lean, they start…
Tesla CEO Elon Musk has been quoted as saying he will "school Toyota on Lean manufacturing."
OK, let's take inspiration and lessons from the apparent Tesla Way management system. What would happen if hospitals and other organizations tried emulating Tesla instead of Toyota? What are the methods and mindsets? The behaviors and principles? What's the management approach and culture?
Back on the podcast for the fifth time is my friend David Meier, a Lean / TPS consultant who is a former Toyota leader at their plant in Georgetown, Kentucky. He's gotten into what's, perhaps, the most Kentucky of industries... distilling bourbon (and more).
I'll have two more podcast episodes where David and I talk about bourbon, whiskey, and continuous improvement for almost 90 minutes total there. Those episodes are coming soon.
Today is a shorter episode, where we catch up and hear more about what David has been doing since his last podcast appearance in 2010 when we talked about the challenges Toyota was facing then. In this episode, David drops a lot of knowledge and wisdom in a very short time -- thoughts on problem solving and how Lean thinking isn't easy for anybody, even if you're Japanese.
My guests for Episode #300 of the podcast are Tracey and Ernie Richardson, authors of the excellent book titled:
The Toyota Engagement Equation: How to Understand and Implement Continuous Improvement Thinking in Any Organization
As I've been writing about "process behavior charts" - a simple, yet effective method for charting and reacting to (or not overreacting to) metrics, it's made curious what some of the modern Toyota books say about metrics and performance measures.... or at least the first two in The Toyota Way series.
Mark’s Note: Last month, I was notified about Prof. Jeff Liker’s retirement from the University of Michigan after 35 years. I wasn’t able to attend the reception for him, unfortunately. But, my friend and former J&J colleague Debra Levantrosser was…
Thanks to Lean Frontiers for sharing a story from Mike Hoseus on LinkedIn. Mike is, of course, co-author of the excellent book Toyota Culture: The Heart and Soul of the Toyota Way (written with Jeff Liker, who I just learned is retiring from the University of Michigan... more on that soon).
Today, I'm announcing a new podcast series called the Toyota Kata Podcast, or "KataCast" for short. As the Toyota Kata book and methodology have become more popular, I've been surprised that I haven't been asked "why don't you blog more about Toyota Kata?" [...]
People often say Lean is pretty simple (or that it’s just “common sense“). Yeah, some of the concepts are simple… but sometimes deceptively so. Or, we find that it’s easier to describe Lean (as a management system, a set of…
