Mistakes are inevitable—but how leaders and organizations respond to them determines whether they improve or repeat the same failures. These posts explore mistakes through a Lean lens: system design vs. “human error,” psychological safety, learning cultures, and leadership behaviors that turn errors into improvement rather than blame.
Drawing from healthcare, manufacturing, aviation, sports, and everyday work, this archive focuses less on who failed—and more on what the system made possible.
Mistakes are inevitable; learning is not. These posts align with ideas I expanded on in The Mistakes That Make Us, which examines how leaders, cultures, and systems determine whether errors become liabilities—or catalysts for improvement.
I loved a recent New York Times article about Chef Gordon Ramsay, including this part: “Ramsay said that when he makes a mistake, he owns up to it. He has been candid about the misjudgments that led to the closure…
Thanks as always to Ryan McCormack for this… there’s always so much good reading, listening, and viewing shared here by him! Subscribe to get these directly from Ryan via email. News, articles, books, podcasts, and videos about how to make…
TL;DR: A true culture of learning doesn’t fear mistakes–it learns from them. Drawing inspiration from Toyota’s mindset, this post explores how psychological safety and problem-solving discipline are essential to preventing repeated errors and building continuous improvement into the DNA of…
This Snickers commercial always makes me chuckle, and I saw it again last night during an NFL playoff game: The punchline is that this stadium worker has meticulously painted, in the end zone, the word CHEFS instead of CHIEFS, as…
This post is built around excerpts from the book The Mistakes That Make Us: Cultivating a Culture of Learning and Innovation. Read more about Toyota, including stories and key lessons learned in the book. Download a free preview Today, we explore…
The book giveaway contest that I’m running ends Friday at about 3 pm ET. ENTER TO WIN a set of all six books that I’ve written or co-authored over the past 15 years. I made a mistake today in my…
I was recently interviewed by Megan Wallin-Kirth for an article she wrote for Quality Digest. I thought she was interviewing me for a broader article about quality, but it ended up being a profile of me and my latest book,…
I don’t share every episode of the “My Favorite Mistake” podcast here, but today’s new episode has great connections to Lean, I think. Or, it’s Lean-adjacent. It’s a discussion I had with Prof. Amy C. Edmondson, from Harvard Business School,…
Scroll down for how to subscribe, transcript, and more My guest for Episode #489 of the Lean Blog Interviews Podcast is Ward Vuillemot, a seasoned C-suite executive with over six years of leading fully remotely while building technology organizations from…
tl;dr summary: In this exploration into the complexities of failure and learning, I draw from a range of entrepreneurs to debunk myths and advocate for a more nuanced understanding. The key takeaway is that failure is only harmful if we…
TL;DR: Psychological safety isn’t created by slogans–it’s created by leader behavior. When leaders respond to mistakes with curiosity, empathy, and support instead of punishment, people feel safer speaking up and organizations learn faster. Using mistakes to learn and improve requires…
In this week’s episode of “My Favorite Mistake,” we’re lucky to have Ken Snyder, a celebrated figure in the realm of business and academia as our guest. Currently serving as the Executive Director at the Shingo Institute and a senior…
