Through mechanisms such as this, mura (unevenness in operations) and muri (overburdening of people) become a part of the workplace. While trying to plow through a cycle of high pressure and, consequently, worry and fatigue, we are not busy looking at the muda (waste & inefficiency) with an eye for improvement. Instead, we are focused only on getting through the day, only to come back tomorrow and do it again the next day. We stop creating, breathing, living and we start only existing, hoping only to survive. Improvement becomes impossible as concern for one another is replaced with detachment and indifference. [Read more]
Northeast Shingo Conference: What I Heard
October 20, 2010 By 4 Comments
While it will take weeks to fully chew on all that was presented and develop some personal reflections on what I was exposed to at the conference, there were some immediate, powerful take-aways that will leave lasting impressions. I was able to see less than half the speakers due to the many simultaneous break-out sessions that went on, however, here is what I took away : [Read more]
The button can push itself: Tools mastery vs. Concept mastery
October 18, 2010 By 4 Comments
We should all delight more in our humanity and the capabilities of people, and stop looking for a button to push. Afterall, in a world where programming enables the button to push itself, we’re wasting our own unique abilities to think, explore, innovate and create when we spend time doing nothing more than learning to push the button. [Read more]
Muda is Bullsh*t!
October 5, 2010 By 8 Comments
A lot of discussions on Lean thinking have pointed to the term “waste” as being misleading or, at the very least, difficult for most audiences to understand. After all, no one likes to think of the work they do as Waste. So, many have endeavored to come up with other terms, or to better define just what Muda is. I believe I may have found a useful alternative that is simple, intuitive, and part of our every day language. [Read more]
The value of lying?
September 20, 2010 By 4 Comments
Those who start out believing lies are OK will find they spend more time creating new ways of lying or, hopefully, they begin un-learning their truth-shading habits. Instead, they have to work on something that children know – trust builds cooperation. In organizations with more than one person, and even hundreds or thousands, lies and power based on positional authority only goes so far. If you want to overcome the competition not just today, but forever, you have to have both employees and customers working with you. If you build the level of trust necessary for them to want to work with you, and not just have to work with you, you will find yourself very far ahead. [Read more]
Why your improvement tools don’t work
September 16, 2010 By Leave a Comment
I’ve been pouring through Jeffrey Liker‘s 2004 book, The Toyota Way recently, and I discovered yet another similarity between what Lean thinkers and other Organizational Effectiveness proponents espouse: When trying to create a new organizational cutlure, most orgainzations look to others that have succeeded, and are then swept away by the need to implement a similar set [...]
Efficiency Frees the Robots
August 30, 2010 By 4 Comments
I recently had a conversation with someone who asked me to explain the concept of the Lean Enterprise. I quickly pitched my best elevator speech on the virtues of waste and value, to which he sarcastically responded, “Yeah. That works great…..if you want to turn everyone into robots.” It was then that I realized 2 [...]
Unemployed need not apply? Fix the Value Stream!
August 18, 2010 By 7 Comments
Ever since it was reported a couple months ago that many recruiters are not considering individuals who are currently unemployed, any number of bloggers, pundits, commentators and others have sounded out about the short-sighted in justice that this policy seems to represent. Many HR pros, however, have responded that the real problem is time: Time [...]
7 Reasons why I hate my desk
July 28, 2010 By 2 Comments
The Desk ought to be a wonderfully powerful productivity engine. It is the most common office standard. Whether Executive corner office or lowly boiler room cubicle, nearly every white collar workplace, and most blue collar places, have a desk of some sort. Unfortunately, the desk fails to live up to its promise. It seems to [...]
Magnetic Poetry: a problem statement A-ha!
July 27, 2010 By 2 Comments
Shuffling the pieces around creates new statements. Back in April of this year, when I started to develop this blog, I wrote a series of posts on Elephant Biting. The concept behind these posts was simple: You can’t take on an entire, big problem all at once. Those problems need to be handled little by [...]
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