In American healthcare, there’s a growing gap between hospitals and clinics that are being innovative and those who are stuck in the “way it’s always been done” mode. For example, innovative primary care clinics are using a combination of better…
Following up on yesterday’s post on seemingly successful experiments with ACOs, here’s another article, from HBR, on “safety huddles” in healthcare: “How Every Hospital Should Start the Day“ I’ve seen some hospitals using daily safety huddles. It sends a powerful message…
You might be considered “wonky” for enjoying the topics discussed here at LeanBlog.org… but that’s fine. This is a safe environment for being wonky about Lean and improvement. From Vox.com, Sarah Kliff normally does a great job covering healthcare topics,…
As I sometimes do, I’m going to close out a bunch of browser tabs (which makes my Mac run faster) and I’ll do that by sharing some articles that caught my eye but maybe don’t merit full blog posts of…
In manufacturing, the term Lean has far too often been synonymous with layoffs. Doing so is more L.A.M.E. than Lean. People get anxious and throw around an acronym LEAN – Less Employees Are Needed. Ironically, Toyota (the inspiration or model for Lean)…
Back in 2007, I had my first opportunity to travel to England, a country I really love visiting. I had the chance to attend the “First Global Lean Healthcare Summit” that was produced by Dan Jones and the Lean Enterprise…
In this podcast episode, Jacob Stoller shares insights from interviewing CEOs across industries and explains why Lean succeeds or fails based less on tools and more on culture, leadership humility, and respect for people. The conversation explores what truly distinguishes…
When we introduce the idea of Lean to healthcare organizations, it’s very common for somebody (often a senior physician) to say something like, “But we don’t want assembly line medicine.” The implication is that assembly lines and factories are cold,…
OK, so it’s not the kind of scientific research that involves lab coats and microscopes, but I’m doing some research that I’d like your help with. I’m looking to do some research and some interviews for writing projects related to…
Lean provides a philosophy and a management model that should be nothing but good for staff and patients. The idea of “respect for people” might sound nice in principle, but what does it mean in a practical sense...
It’s really easy to make statements like “patient safety is our top priority.” That same statement can be applied to hospital staff, as well. Or, it should. But the “happy talk” (as Pascal Dennis calls it) isn’t always followed up…
Returning to the podcast after his first appearance in Episode #188 is Daniel T. Jones, founder and chairman of the UK-based Lean Enterprise Academy. You can find him on Twitter now as @DanielJonesLean. Dan collaborated with Jim Womack on the books The…
