Month: February 2011

In my work as co-founder of the Lean Learning Center, we focus primarily on our clients and their challenges. I’m generally not that aware of what our competition is doing. As a result, I am sometimes very surprised by some of the stories I hear from our clients about other

Not many people want to be the victim of micro-management. And most managers don’t espouse operating that way. But not all micro-management is created equal. As organizations pursue lean effort,s I see a tension between making problems visible and micro-management. Many organizations are very sensitive to anything that feels like

I have a new post published on Assembly Magazine. See the full article on that site. I have written “Leading Lean” for ASSEMBLY for over 5 years. This marks my 55th and final contribution. I still have plenty to say, but it’s time for me to move on from this

Guest Post: Shawn Patterson is the Senior Director of Corporate Services at DTE Energy where he is responsible for the Supply Chain, Fleet, Facilities, and Continuous Improvement organizations. Shawn has held numerous positions in multiple industries and is passionate about influencing lean transformations in organizations. In light of recent financial

  Everyone wants to copy the best. That’s why companies such as Toyota and General Electric have been popular sources of benchmarking. That’s why Chrysler was so highly benchmarked when we were the most profitable car company. In the lean community, I have observed a common practice of filtering ideas

“Perfection is not attainable. But if we chase perfection, we can catch excellence.” These words by Vince Lombardi encompass a great deal of the lean mindset. Mark Graban at LeanBlog.org recently wrote about this quote, and so I was reminded of an article I wrote almost 10 years ago. The

This is my last column of Leading Lean for Assembly Magazine. After 5 years and 55 columns, it is time to move on. The column can be found here. I will soon be starting a new column very soon for Industry Week magazine. The title will be Lessons from the