Books shape how we think about leadership, improvement, and learning—but only if we reflect on them and apply their lessons thoughtfully. This archive includes blog posts and podcast episodes about Lean, healthcare, leadership, mistakes, psychological safety, and continuous improvement, including reflections on my own books and conversations with authors whose work has influenced how organizations build better systems and cultures.
Joining me for episode #208 is Michael Bremer, author of the recently released book How to Do a Gemba Walk. Michael is president of The Cumberland Group, a business improvement consulting firm based in Illinois. In today’s episode, Michael talks about…
My guest for episode #206 is Ed Pound, co-author of the book Factory Physics for Managers: How Leaders Improve Performance in a Post-Lean Six Sigma World that was released in April. It is, of course, a new version of the original Factory…
I’m an avid book buyer, book reader, and published book author. Amazon is one of my favorite places to shop, not just for books. I first bought a book from Amazon back in 1997, right before I went to MIT. There…
Joining me today for Episode #204 is Paul Plsek, and we’re talking about his excellent book (a Shingo Research Award recipient this year) titled Accelerating Health Care Transformation with Lean and Innovation: The Virginia Mason Experience. Virginia Mason, of course,…
My guest for episode 200 is Paul Spiegelman, author of the book Patients Come Second: Leading Change by Changing the Way You Lead. Today, we’re talking about his book and its provocative title – what do you mean patients don’t…
I am an unabashed fan of the ThedaCare Center for Healthcare Value, as you’re probably aware. For full disclosure, I was previously an employee of the Lean Enterprise Institute, a key partner of the Center. They have a lot of…
I get a lot of emails from regular readers or people who have just stumbled across my blog. I try to be as helpful as I can (although I’m not really a good connection for Lean healthcare jobs that people…
When I recently did a Healthcare Kaizen workshop near Detroit, I invited an old friend of mine to attend as a guest. Marisa Smith, an entrepreneur and business owner in Ann Arbor, saw the connections between my Kaizen work and a…
My books are generally well reviewed, thankfully. But, I realize they aren’t inexpensive. The prices are set by my publisher and the prices were increased a few bucks for Lean Hospitals and Healthcare Kaizen. The Executive Guide to Healthcare Kaizen was left untouched, thankfully.…
Mark’s note: Today’s guest post is an excerpt from the book Remarkable by Toby LaVigne. Toby’s bio can be found at the bottom of this post. In this chapter from the book, Toby writes about a good friend of mine and…
My guest for episode #186 is my friend Jon Miller, CEO of Kaizen Institute and a long-time blogger at Gemba Panta Rei. Today, we’re talking about his upcoming book, Creating a Kaizen Culture: Align the Organization, Achieve Breakthrough Results, and…
After the paperback release about two weeks ago, my latest book (co-authored with Joe Swartz), The Executive Guide to Healthcare Kaizen is now available in Amazon’s Kindle format. It’s currently only $16 to purchase. It’s funny how the overall extended…
