Today’s blog post will be just a bunch of random thoughts. For one, I just got back from London last night after a whirlwind Lean healthcare tour. I visited five hospitals between London and the south of England in three…
Toyota Names Akio Toyoda President, Apologizes to Shareholders for Losses This was rumored for a while, but Toyota has formally named Akio Toyoda as the next President. Yes, “Toyoda” with a “d” — that’s the family name. Back when Toyota…
Clarity Is Missing Link in Supply Chain – WSJ.com Ah, here we go, it’s time for the annual Just-In-Time-bashing article from the Wall Street Journal. Some past “the WSJ doesn’t get it” posts include: This WSJ Article (as do Many…
BBC World Service – Business – 5/05/2009 – Car Crash The BBC aired a revisiting of a story from 2007, I found this thanks to an alert on Twitter, a message from a guy named @KanuDawg said: Some guy named…
TL;DR: Ford wants to learn from Toyota without blindly copying–but Lean isn’t just about continuous improvement and efficiency. Without a deep commitment to respect for people and long-term thinking, copying Toyota’s tools won’t deliver Toyota’s results. Ford CEO Mulally shares…
‘Most Indian managers don’t know what is possible’ Jim Womack was recently in India, as this article in the Business Standard publication. It’s kind of unfortunate for them that they abbreviate the publication’s name as “BS”…. such as their “BS…
That sure is an unfortunate Time magazine cover with that headline and an illustration of a really emaciated piggy bank.
Jim Womack’s E-letters – Respect for People Jim Womack’s most recent e-letter is one of the best I’ve read in quite a while. I think he really nails it, the compare and contrast of a Lean notion of “respect for…
Roger Smith, Former G.M. Chief, Dies – New York Times Roger Smith passed away at age 82. While he was demonized by Michael Moore and he’s been criticized here for his “lights out factory” vision, Roger Smith tried many innovative…
IndustryWeek : Thought Leaders — Lean On Me (Full Transcript)IndustryWeek : Thought Leaders — Lean On Me (Print Version) Other blogs, including Gemba Panta Rei have already linked to this, but I’ll also post it with a few different highlights.…
Recently, I saw Jim Womack give two talks at the Global Lean Healthcare Summit. One was a talk that could have applied, about Lean in a general sense, to a manufacturing audience as well as a healthcare crowd. One point…
In this Lean Blog Podcast episode, Jim Womack reflects on GM, Ford, and Toyota through the lens of Lean thinking–past, present, and future. He explains how Lean was coined at MIT, why it became misunderstood, and what leaders still get…
