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.
I have always learned a lot from John Shook. As I’ve blogged about before, I’ve seen John present about TPS and management (leadership, really) a few times and probably learn more “insights per hour” than anyone else in the Lean…
Tomorrow’s blog post today… not that anyone will be reading anything non-Michael Jackson related. RIP. A modern tidbit… I learned about the news via a friend’s Facebook status update. The new, new media, I suppose. Communications Woes Show at Boeing…
This is an interview with Dr. Sami Bahri, D.D.S., a dentist from Jacksonville, Florida. He is a pioneer in using Lean methods in the management of his dental practice. The book documents his learning journey for himself and his office…
How the Mighty Fall: A Primer on the Warning Signs – BusinessWeek Jim Collins, of Good to Great fame, has a new book out called How The Mighty Fall: And Why Some Companies Never Give In. Excerpts were printed in…
Lean Leap to Health Care #7 (click for Part #6) by Scott McDuffee “Where is the main entrance? Why do I follow the signs to HERE? Now you are telling me to go all the way down THERE! How far…
Toyota Posts Big Loss, Signals More to Come – WSJ.com I saw this article on Saturday and it reminded me to go ahead and blog about a few other articles I’ve seen about Japanese CEOs lately. The big news about…
NBA, Olympic coach Chuck Daly dies at 78 I grew up outside of Detroit during the Detroit Pistons “Bad Boys” era so I spent a lot of time watching Chuck Daly, who just passed away yesterday. Daly had a reputation…
Management Tip of the Day :: April 15, 2009 :: HarvardBusiness.org It’s nice to see HBR, for once, spreading the message of Dr. Deming. If you have tough financial circumstances in your company, one of their four tips includes: Don’t…
Back in February, I did a parody of a “Goofus and Gallant” cartoon, if you remember them from “Highlights for Kids” magazine that was in every doctor’s office and dentist’s waiting room. I was having some concerns about copyright infringement,…
by Jamie Flinchbaugh, co-author, The Hitchhiker’s Guide to Lean I believe that NIH, or Not Invented Here, is one of the silliest cultural barriers to progress. What we’re basically saying is that there are good ideas out there, ideas that…
Toyota Poised to Make Shift in North America – WSJ.com Interesting WSJ comment from this recent piece about planned management changes in North America. Jim Lentz, Toyota’s head of North American sales, said Wednesday it was “premature” to talk of…
In Japan, more CEOs share the pain of tough times – USATODAY.com The USA Today, whether they’re trying or not, is doing a good job recently of highlighting issues at least somewhat related to Toyota and the Deming philosophy. While…
