Lean Connections

Posted yesterday by John Moe who is currently Head of Business Consulting at Alphacourt Limited in the UK.    I’ve been following his posts for a while now and would classify a number of them as “seriously brilliant.”    John, I know quite a few of us Yanks will be grinning over lunch today as we read this.    Adam Zak

“Have you been confronted by a Black Belt recently? Unless you are into martial arts then this has most likely happened at work when you have been hit by a Lean Six Sigma (6S) initiative (or possibly operative if you got in the way). I am using 6S here to encompass both the Lean Manufacturing and Six Sigma concepts, particularly as many organisations tend to use a hybrid of the two. What started off as a way for manufacturers to actual work out how to build something that didn’t disintegrate/explode/maim unexpectedly as soon as the punter got the product home (or in the case of British Leyland before you got home), has turned into a quasi-religious movement that comes with its own zealots and sacred texts”.  

More chuckles as you read the full text of John’s post here…

A guest posting by Andrew Dillon

Extraordinary times call on us to look again to the core of the Toyota revolution and how we can make it our own

Strange things happen in a crisis. Consider, for example, that some companies, in retrenchment mode, are cutting back on investments that not too long ago they were eager to make in learning and implementing the principles of the Toyota Production System. At least part of the market for improvement seems to be shrinking, in other words, at precisely the moment when just about everything in the marketplace seems to need improvement.

This is more than just strange. After all, Toyota’s management system was forged as a response to severe economic hardship, its basic mindset tempered by the threat of catastrophe. Circumstances have changed over the years, of course, but the Toyota system has proven to offer a potent and strikingly reliable way to survive-and even thrive-against fierce competition, in hard times as well as good. Its signal strengths – relentless cost cutting, commitment to people and dedication to long-term vision – are made for crisis.

Clearly the message is not lost on some businesses, where leaders are intensifying their focus on learning lean. But other companies remain a puzzlement. Why, when they stand to profit from it most, are some retreating from efforts to reap the benefits of the Toyota revolution?  read more »