Thanks to Ron Pereira and the team at Gemba Academy for having me as a guest for the sixth time on their Gemba Academy Podcast (find past episodes via Google). Here is a direct MP3 link to the episode, click…
Thanks to Catalysis for asking me to write a guest blog post… yesterday, they published this: Being Open to Learning and Using Process Behavior Charts Means Unlearning Something Else My post starts: “Why don’t people adopt best practices? I get…
TL;DR: Headlines calling College Football Playoff ratings “all-time lows” are technically true but misleading. When viewed with Process Behavior Charts, the ratings show routine variation, not a meaningful decline. Overexplaining year-to-year changes wastes time and distracts leaders from improving the…
TL;DR: This recorded webinar shows how Process Behavior Charts help leaders distinguish real signals from routine noise in performance metrics–so they stop overreacting to every up-and-down and focus instead on improving the system in meaningful, sustainable ways. As I blogged…
I take no joy in the troubles of any automaker, be it Tesla, Nissan, GM or any others over time.
Of course, Nissan and GM have been in the news most recently, with the firing (and jailing) of Nissan and Renault CEO Carlos Ghosn. And now, GM has announced major layoffs, the cancelation of some passenger car programs, and the shutdown (and possible closure) of five plants in North America.
I was talking to a friend the other day and I predicted that we'd see news headlines about something like "GM to get Leaner." These headlines would be using the word "lean" to mean "get smaller" instead of referring to "Lean" (which I capitalize as a proper noun) as a synonym for the Toyota Production System.
I was disappointed to hear GM's CEO, Mary Barra, a long-time GM employee using the word "lean" in the context of the company getting smaller.
Here is a new article that I posted on LinkedIn... don't worry, it's not political, but it does look at recent voter turnout rates through a statistical lens. And I think it's a lens that's helpful for looking at metrics in our own organizations:
"How to Tell the Difference Between ‘Signal’ and ‘Noise’ in Voter Turnout Numbers or Your Organization’s Metrics"
I'll be presenting a free webinar on Wednesday, October 31st at 1 pm ET... as you might notice, that's Halloween day!
Here's the description from the KaiNexus website:
Metrics & Statistics Don't Have to be Scary
Why do we have to be skeptical or careful when we see a chart with just four data points? Does such limited data help prove that our consulting work or our Lean Sigma project has made a difference?
The other day, I saw a post on Twitter that included a few photos related to what's often called Lean Daily Management practices in a hospital.
The spirit of my post is not meant to come across as "they're doing it wrong" but more in the spirit of "they're doing a lot of great things, but it would be better if..."
If Lean Daily Management is supposed to be, at its core, about identifying opportunities for improvement, I'd hope they wouldn't be offended by my recommendations, but I also don't want to link to the Twitter post or call them out by name. I will pass along private feedback through a channel I have. But, I'm writing a post because what I see here is VERY common in different organizations (not just healthcare).
Last week was our first "Symposium on Learning Organizations" where we brought together 40 people with diverse backgrounds in manufacturing, healthcare, IT, government, and other industries or professions together to learn from each other in a "PowerPoint-free zone."
In this post, I'll share some photos and reflections on our tour of the Toyota truck plant in San Antonio (TMMTX). The visitor center has been completely revamped from my last visit, just as the one visitor center I saw in Japan back in March had been redone.
Thanks to my friend Katie Anderson for writing a blog post about my latest book Measures of Success.
Visit the post and you'll see a link that goes to a book giveaway contest, where I am giving away (with Katie's help, of course), three copies of the eBook (the paperback book is coming later this year).
oday's episode is the second time that friend and podcast guest Jamie Flinchbaugh has turned the tables by playing host to interview me about my new book, Measures of Success: React Less, Lead Better, Improve More, which has recently been the #1 best selling book in Amazon's Total Quality Management category.
Jamie is very knowledgeable on these topics, so he was a great person to interview me and to have more of a conversation about choosing the right metrics and then managing them the right way. I hope you enjoy the conversation and future podcasts will return to the usual format where I interview guests and try to let them do most of the talking.
