In the Lean movement, organizations are often wise to have some variation on a “no layoffs due to Lean” policy, as I’ve written about before. Many healthcare organizations, including ThedaCare, have made this commitment quite publicly. Since Lean is about…
After last week’s piece on “putting the continuous back into continuous improvement,” I had another article published this past week. This new article was published in the publication “Hospitals & Health Networks,” co-authored with Rob Harding, and it’s called “Cut…
On a recent Sunday morning, I was watching cable news channels and two different commercials had a word jump out at me, words that are commonly used in the Lean management system. One commercial featured the term “mistake proofed” and…
On Friday, there was yet another Wall Street Journal article about Lean (fixating as they always do on the “Just In Time” component). The article titled “For Lean Factories, No Buffer” yet again takes an outdated 1980s view that Lean…
It has been a while since I’ve collaborated with artist Ed Butler on a “Doofus and Leanie” cartoon (Ed was also the artist for Wii Lean and the satirical “Lean Sensei” app. The recent reactions of GM (layoffs) and Toyota…
TL;DR — GM vs. Toyota After the Japan Earthquake General Motors (GM) Toyota Bottom line:This wasn’t a failure of JIT or Lean. It was a leadership choice. Toyota showed that real Lean is about how you treat people when work…
It’s time for a Lean Blog feature where I throw a few links at you – articles I’ve saved and read that maybe don’t merit a full post, but are worth sharing and making a brief comment on. I often…
Thanks to FierceHealthcare.com for publishing my guest article on the front page of their site: “How lean management helped hospitals avoid layoffs.” The article features quotes from two of our Healthcare Value Network organizations, ThedaCare and Akron Children’s Hospital, and…
This blog post is about my first visit to TMMTX in 2010.
Generally, with the term “lean,” it’s easy for people to leap to a conclusion that Lean equals layoffs. This is often the fear in healthcare when Lean consultants are involved, especially since consultants usually equals cost cutting in healthcare, which…
It’s nice to see examples of Lean Healthcare success in the news, this time on the front page of the Denver Post — “Denver Health saves millions using Toyota efficiency principles.” As the city health system, they are both an…
TL;DR: An NPR story about workplace “efficiency” illustrates L.A.M.E.–Lean As Misguidedly Executed–where tools like 5S are applied without respect for people or employee engagement. True Lean builds capability with the people doing the work, not through top-down cost cutting. Oh…