In 2009, I wrote about a nurses’ union in New Brunswick that supported Lean because they realized this methodology could help reduce waiting times and improve working conditions. It’s win Yet, as part of the recent politicized Lean healthcare brew-ha-ha in…
The price paid for most management consulting work is based on either a daily rate or some variation of a flat-rate fee based on what is being delivered. Enterprise software pricing is also often fixed. In both cases, the client…
Since the healthcare improvement work I do is apolitical and non-partisan, I’m generally not one to butt into the political affairs of Canada or other countries. But, when I hear complaints about Lean or when it’s being called a “scam”…
After some supporters of the Saskatchewan Lean healthcare efforts reached out to me, I’ve been trying to follow everything that’s being said and written – which is hard to do (just try a Google news search). There are many facets to…
Last week was the annual LEI Lean Transformation Summit (see my notes here). There were many inspiring stories, but are always reminders that it’s not always a Lean world around us. Tom Ehrenfeld (who blogged about the two days of…
As National Patient Safety Awareness Week continues, thanks go to Graham Foster for sending me this article from the UK: Most NHS staff deem care ‘fit for their own family’. Well, that’s a positive, happy sounding headline. “Most” think the care…
Retired Navy F-14 pilot and airline captain Steve “Monty” Montague spends his non-flying days helping hospitals adopt the safety culture that made commercial aviation the safest way to travel. In this episode, we talk about why standardized work frees people…
We’ve all seen it. We’ve probably all done it. What’s that? Jumping to solutions. I hope this illustration I created gives you a bit of pause… not just to laugh at others, but to reflect on this personally.
Push vs. pull in healthcare is about what triggers work or replenishment. A push system acts on a schedule or forecast; a pull system responds to a signal of need or consumption. Flow is a related but different question: how…
My guest for episode #194 is Paul Piechota, Director for the Center for Competitive Change at the University of Dayton School of Engineering. Piechota has authored over 30 publications with such titles as Transforming the Enterprise, Getting to the Future First!, and Establishing a…
Out there in the Lean and quality improvement communities, you sometimes hear some silly things. Sometimes, I want to attach the “Lean As Mistakenly Explained” (or L.A.M.E.) label to what’s said when it really seems off the mark from what…
It has been right about three years since I was introduced to Dr. Greg Jacobson via a reader of this blog. It was great to meet a physician who had read, loved, and practiced the ideas from Masaaki Imai’s book Kaizen.…
