In the business management context, continuous improvement means a never-ending effort to identify and eliminate the root causes of problems that produce errors or diminish customer value. Most often, it consists of many incremental improvements rather than one drastic change. Continuous improvement is an integral part of Japanese culture, which endeavors to improve on an […]

This week’s guest is Alex Judd. Ron and Alex listened to and discussed David Foster Wallace’s famous commencement speech, “This Is Water.” This is a very powerful episode that contains some great food for thought for the new year. An MP3 audio version of this episode is available for download here. In this episode you’ll […]

Each day we are presented with experiences that can teach us key aspects of leadership. Halloween is today! Whether you’re going to a party or have kids you have to rope into their costumes, Halloween is a holiday you shouldn’t be sleeping on. Let’s take a moment to think about how this fall holiday can […]

Mechanical engineering is considered the most interdisciplinary of all engineering majors because of its intersections with other academic fields, including civil, chemical, and industrial engineering. Therefore, mechanical engineers can work on various projects in many companies. Due to the diversity of the industry, mechanical engineers have always had a wide range of employment options, and […]

If you’re a leader looking to improve employee engagement and performance at your organization, it pays to spend time working with the people who can deliver more impact than any other—managers. Middle managers play a key role in employee engagement, creating a respectful and trusting relationship with their direct reports, communicating company values and setting […]

On Fridays I will post a Lean related Quote. Throughout our lifetimes many people touch our lives and leave us with words of wisdom. These can both be a source of new learning and also a point to pause and reflect upon lessons we have learned. Within Lean active learning is an important aspect on […]

It is a goal-setting methodology used by companies to set clear, measurable objectives and track progress toward them. OKRs are designed to be ambitious and stretch goals and are typically developed quarterly or annually. Introduction The concept of OKRs was introduced by Andy Grove, the former CEO of Intel, in the 1980s. Since then, OKRs […]

Complacency is all around us, but it (and the problems it brings) can be especially noticeable in the workplace. If people have stopped going the extra mile and if they seem totally content with the status quo, their complacency could be hurting your organization. The good news is that complacency often comes after some success, […]

Introduction Managing a project is a multifaceted process that requires planning, scheduling, reporting, and tracking. Gaps in communication, resource allocation, or backup plan can affect project progress and business profitability. This article sheds light on the importance of project management and the pivotal role it plays in ensuring business profitability. What Is Project Management? Project […]

By Pascal Dennis (bio) Recently, I spent several days with the great Joe Lodato and the Constrada team of homebuilding & maintenance contractors. Joe & team have for years now helped maintain & improve our charming but somewhat old (1940’s) family home. Things always come up – this time it was water leaks in the […]

‘Tis the season for giving — that’s what they say, anyway. There are times when in order to take care of others you need to take care of yourself first. It sounds counterintuitive and certainly against the spirit of the holidays, but sometimes it’s true. Here are three tips to help you make more time for […]

By Pascal Dennis (bio) What a terrible waste of humanity – Taiichi Ohno Our recent blog on Bozos generated some buzz – thanks, all. Thought I’d expand on a few points. Poor HR policies and processes create bozos. In the absence of purpose, and easy ways of getting involved, people lose their energy and optimism. […]

On Fridays I will post a Lean related Quote. Throughout our lifetimes many people touch our lives and leave us with words of wisdom. These can both be a source of new learning and also a point to pause and reflect upon lessons we have learned. Within Lean active learning is an important aspect on […]

By Pascal Dennis (bio) Like many of you, I was lucky enough to go to a professional school in a well-known university. My studies were in business and engineering. Chats with colleagues who went into law, medicine, nursing, architecture and so on, suggest we picked up similar mental models and habits. Many of my courses […]

For my Facebook fans you already know about this great feature. But for those of you that are not connected to A Lean Journey on Facebook or Twitter I post daily a feature I call Lean Tips.  It is meant to be advice, things I learned from experience, and some knowledge tidbits about Lean to […]

“Bridging the gap between Industry 4.0 vendors & manufacturers” As an unintended consequence of my lean work I’ve spent the last 2 years advising clients on where digital manufacturingmight add value. Might is the word to ponder in the previous sentence. For example, I’ll encourage a client to run anexperiment to test a simple hypothesis […]

By Pascal Dennis (bio) Good problem solving entails moving fluidly between the worlds of Reflection & Experience. Go See (genchi genbutsu) is central to the latter. Analytical tools like the famous Q7 Quality Tools are abstractions that exist in the world of Reflection. Problem solving begins in the world of Experience. What is actually happening […]

The modern business landscape is full of buzzwords and passing management fads, so it isn’t surprising if you hear of a new “methodology” and just let it go in one ear and out the other. However, it’s a good idea to make an exception for Lean business management. The Lean approach is one of the […]

Every business wants to be successful and generate results. If only there was a simple formula we could use to make that happen. Well actually, for decades there has been. Maybe you’re not familiar with it but that’s what I’m sharing with you today. We are looking at John Adair’s Action Centered Leadership model. Back […]

A blog like this would usually be titled “Best of…” but I don’t subscribe to the idea of “best” when it comes to knowledge transfer. It’s tough to compare the benefits of person A picking up the right bit of knowledge at the right time to help them with their own situational conundrum, to person […]

By Pascal Dennis (bio) Just finished Dreadnought, Robert Massie‘s splendid account of the years leading up to World War 1. My favourite character is Admiral John (Jackie) Fisher who transformed the Royal Navy – just in time. Fisher was a Lean thinker, far ahead of his time. His obsession was improving the speed and accuracy […]

Agile and Waterfall are two different approaches to project management. Agile is a project management approach focused on flexibility and continuous delivery. It is based on delivering small pieces of working software frequently rather than trying to deliver everything at once at the end of the project. Agile approaches encourage collaboration and adaptability, and they […]

Anyone who has taken an introductory course in probability, or even SPC, has heard of the law of large numbers. It’s a powerful result from probability theory, and, perhaps, the most widely used. Wikipedia starts the article on this topic with a statement that is free of any caveat or restrictions: In probability theory, the […]

On Fridays I will post a Lean related Quote. Throughout our lifetimes many people touch our lives and leave us with words of wisdom. These can both be a source of new learning and also a point to pause and reflect upon lessons we have learned. Within Lean active learning is an important aspect on […]

Almost done now. If you missed Part 1 ,click here, Part 2 is ,here. If not, here’s the final scuffle with the UK Director. 30 October I wrote: Hi [Brand Director], You’re expecting my email I assume and I hope [Dealer Principal] has briefed you in advance. For your ease I have invested time collating the […]

By Pascal Dennis (bio) One of my great work pleasures is helping to translate the System of Profound Knowledge, as Deming called it, for new and different industries. Taiichi Ohno, Deming, Shingo, Juran et al have given us fundamental principles gained through hard experience. But we have to translate these so they work for us […]

Few things will demoralize employees more easily than feeling like they’re not being appreciated for their efforts. Making sure that employees who are delivering effort and results hear you express something along the lines of “thanks for your hard work” is vital. Even this basic action gives them recognition for their efforts, which becomes feedback […]

If you missed Part 1 ,click here. If not, here’s the continued wrangle with the Dealer Principal. 30 September I wrote to [Dealer Prinicpal & cc’d Service Manager]: Good Afternoon [Dealer Principal], Your thoughts on the attached email trail please.  Russell Watkins —————————————————————————————————————- 1 October I wrote: [Dealer Principal], Thank you for your phone message […]

By Pascal Dennis (bio) The past several years the Lean Pathways team and I have been lucky enough to work in agriculture. Good, smart, well-trained people, an instinctive grasp of the PDCA cycle, and a solid ethical foundation. The soil, so to speak, is fertile indeed. (And the gemba is often glorious.) We should tip […]

We review techniques from histograms to Kernel Density Estimators (KDE) to analyze the variability of measurements through the example of water quality data from India in 2021. The post Analyzing Variation with Histograms, KDE, and the Bootstrap appeared first on Michel Baudin's Blog.

In this post I would like to talk about two other plants that we visited as part of the Van of Nerds in France. One is a railway repair and maintenance plant by SNCF, and the other is a body shop and final assembly by the well-known French car maker Renault. Both offered interesting insights. […]

The 1:10:100 rule is a principle that suggests it is more cost-effective to invest in preventative measures to avoid problems rather than waiting until problems occur and trying to fix them later. The rule states that for every $1 spent on prevention, $10 can be saved on corrective measures, and $100 can be saved on […]

The downside of growing lean skill is the gnawing certainty that almost all systems are broken, creating varying degrees of pain for Customers. There is a helpful upside to this world weariness when wrestling with even Toyota ,(see here) or Lexus, the subject of this 3 part blog. That upside is the question “What is […]

By Pascal Dennis (bio) Be willing to make decisions. That’s the most important quality in a good leader.General George S. Patton Nothing is more difficult, and therefore more precious, than to be able to decide.Napoleon Bonaparte Plenty of misconceptions about this one. We seem to think that developing our strategy entails asking each member of […]