Leadership isn’t about titles, charisma, or quick decisions—it’s about creating systems where people can do their best work and continuously improve. This archive brings together blog posts, podcasts, and reflections on leadership through a Lean lens, drawing on ideas from Deming, Toyota, healthcare, and real-world management practice. The common theme: leaders shape culture, influence behavior, and own the systems that produce results—for better or worse.
Here is an article from HealthLeaders Media about the Transforming Care at the Bedside program: “Rural Oregon Hospitals Implement Frontline Caregiver Program.” TCAB is a program that’s similar to the UK NHS program called Releasing Time to Care where nurses…
Hat tip to Dan Markovitz for pointing out this excellent post on John Toussaint’s blog: “The Key Leadership Behaviors in a Lean Organization?” The post is a letter written by Paul O’Neill answering a question from a hospital leader. Paul…
tl;dr: When a leader yells, people learn fear–not lessons. True coaching means helping others learn from mistakes instead of punishing them. Whether on the football field or in the workplace, the best leaders build confidence, not compliance. I was happy…
Thanks to Andrew Bishop for posting a link to this article the other day. The New York Times had an article on Sunday titled, “Do Happier People Work Harder?” I think the answer, clearly, is yes. The outlook from a…
I was going through some old notes I’ve taken when visiting different hospitals and I came up with this quote from a healthcare professional: “I’ve never worked in a place where managers asked ‘how can I help you?’” The good…
Bob Lutz spent 47 years in the auto industry at GM, Ford, BMW, and Chrysler, and in this 2011 conversation he talks about his book Car Guys vs. Bean Counters, the “blanderizer” effect on product design, and why he thinks…
On his blog, John Toussaint shared this letter from ThedaCare CEO Dean Gruner to all employees. Toussaint said the letter is inspired by Paul O’Neill and his thoughts on patient safety (you can hear my podcast with O’Neill here, as…
As someone who started his career in the auto industry, I’m excited to be interviewing a modern auto-industry legend on Friday for an upcoming podcast — Bob Lutz, the retired former Vice Chairman of General Motors. We’ll be talking about…
As I’ve worked with different hospitals and different leaders, I’ve sometimes wondered if there’s been a study on the differences in results between hospitals that have a physician CEO vs. those that have a non-physician CEO. Which hospitals have better…
What happens when a Fortune 500 CEO brings a long-term mindset and a bold commitment to safety into healthcare? In this conversation with Paul O’Neill, former U.S. Treasury Secretary and CEO of Alcoa, we explore how leadership, transparency, and aiming…
Did anybody see the new movie, the comedy “Horrible Bosses” this weekend? If so, leave a comment and let us know what you thought – should I see it next weekend or wait for home video? The trailer looks pretty…
This is always a tongue-in-cheek warning, but there are times when I warn hospital leaders that they have to be careful when going to the “gemba” (gemba being a Japanese word used in Lean to describe the place where the…
