REVIEW - The Republic of Tatarstan officially endorses and funds the implementation of lean thinking in local organizations. Yalcin Ipbuken, President of Lean Institute Turkey, drops in for a visit.
FEATURE – The fifth article in the series Hazards on the road to lean analyzes the role of quality defects in helping to develop a lean management culture in your organization.
FEATURE - Mission creep, silos and a disengaged workforce are some of the negative effects of traditional management. Michael Ballé offers an alternative based on the respect for people principle of lean thinking.
OPINION – A trip to West Africa to deliver a lean workshop prompts Anton Grütter, CEO of Lean Institute Africa, to reflect on the meaning of the Andon cord.
OPINION - What does it take to start a lean implementation? People often hesitate, blaming lack of preparedness at different management levels. Truth is, all you need is two front line people who are committed.
FEATURE – René Aernoudts discusses how to use standardized work in an organization, providing a lowdown of the techniques available to the lean practitioner.
VIDEO INTERVIEW - At last month's UK Lean Summit, we sat down with Dan Jones and Jim Womack, founding fathers of lean thinking, to discuss the evolution, current state and future of the methodology.
VIDEO INTERVIEW - At the Lean IT Summit, we spoke with Amazon Web Services to understand what type of flexible and scalable IT infrastructure allows organizations to be innovative without breaking the bank.
CASE STUDY - A Turkish shipyard and engineering company has found that lean principles and practice are the only way to deliver unique, large construction projects efficiently and successfully.
NEWS - By offering tours of best-in-class companies and bespoke training to MBA students from Moscow State University's Business School, LGN's Turkish affiliate is helping to spread lean thinking in Russia.
FEATURE – An obeya room can be the cornerstone of a lean transformation, but developing a successful visual management environment is easier said than done. Nike’s Technology department shares a few tips.
FEATURE – Is your organization process-oriented or results-oriented? The fourth article of Hazards on the road to lean looks at what happens when you focus on the what, but not on the how.
VIDEO INTERVIEW - We spoke with Toyota Motor Europe's CIO at the Lean IT Summit about hoshin and IT, the application of the agile methodology, and the power of coaching.
ARTICLE – The Institut de Medicina Legal de Catalunya has learned that employee engagement and lean thinking can shake up even the stiffest of the public sector's working environments.
INTERVIEW – We speak with Sérgio Caracciolo of General Motors do Brasil about the carmaker’s approach to lean, its struggles, and its lessons learned.
ARTICLE - To operate successfully we need systems, but as we grow these often give us "big company disease." The solution is bringing leadership at work level to really guarantee customer satisfaction.
INTERVIEW - In our search for the perfect solution, we often seem to ignore the user's needs. Jeff Gothelf explains why this is nonsense and what lies at the heart of the Lean UX software development methodology.
NEWS - LEI partners with the Institute for Intrapreneurship to help established and startup companies to become more innovative using lean thinking and practices.
FEATURE - Britain’s National Audit Office looks at how well taxpayer money is spent, gaining invaluable insight into the use of lean management in central government.
FEATURE - London-based startup Elastera may represent the example of a company aspiring to be lean from the outset rather than trying to fix itself later through a transformation.
FEATURE – We can have the best processes in place and the best people on payroll, but if our goals are wrong our drive towards lean management won't be enough. Part 3 of Hazards on the road to lean.
FEATURE – Effectively applying just-in-time and achieving flow is impossible without leveling production first. Yet, most companies seem to think this is impossible because demand is so variable… but is it really?
RESEARCH - Standard work is not meant for senior leadership, but there are activities that CEOs can carry out systematically to support a lean management system, starting from problem solving.
ARTICLE - Are some national cultures better suited to implement lean thinking? This article, based on research on 45 Volvo factories, reflects on the role of local cultures in the rollout of a corporate lean program.
INTERVIEW - We caught up with LEI’s Senior Advisor, Jim Morgan after his plenary talk at the Lean Summit in São Paulo last month and got him to answer a few questions about product development and lean management.
INTERVIEW - Lean manufacturing principles, successful training programs and the involvement of management in daily continuous improvement are transforming Brazilian automotive supplier ZEN.
CASE STUDY – A unique approach to lean management and the involvement of CEO Mario Nardi helped Pietro Fiorentini, provider of solutions for natural gas distribution, become a model for lean companies in Italy.
ARTICLE - How can creativity and standards coexist? How do we move beyond silos? How do we fully understand the voice of the customer? Dan Jones reflects on three key questions for the lean movement.
INTERVIEW - Planet Lean speaks with Constantin May, Academic Director of the CEPTM institute at Germany’s Ansbach University, which organized the first Lean Educator Conference in Europe in co-operation with LGN.
EVENT REVIEW – This year LGN and Ansbach University’s CEPTM co-organized the first European edition of the Lean Educator Conference. Planet Lean attended the event.
FEATURE – In a transformation, should we spread responsibilities across the business or go for a centralized Lean Office? For their second piece, our Polish colleagues look at what they have learned on the field.
INTERVIEW – Brian Swain, Director of the Lean Construction Institute UK, has supported some of the largest construction projects in Britain, including London’s Olympic Village. Here he talks about the evolution of lean in the industry.
FEATURE - It took a Spanish clinical diagnostics instruments manufacturer the introduction of a new product to realize how an old-fashioned system and management style were preventing the company from thriving.
BOOK REVIEW – For our series of Q&As on recently published novel Lead With Respect, René Aernoudts shares what the key lessons learnt were for him.
NEWS - LGN's Polish affiliate is taking part in a European project to shed a light onto the development of meta products.
CASE STUDY - Three successful improvement projects at a hospital in Guangzhou are proving that lean healthcare in China is an opportunity that the sector cannot afford to miss.
OPINION – How many times, in the early stages of kaizen events, have you thought about giving up? Hang in there. As frustrating as they can be, they will also teach you a lot, says our Danish colleague.
FEATURE - In this new series, our Polish colleagues draw on their experience with customers and discuss the most common mistakes people make in their lean implementations.
ARTICLE - There is more to TWI than applications in our jobs. In this article, a creative mother shares the moving story of how she used Job Instructions to help her 5-year-old son with Asperger Syndrome.
BOOK REVIEW - In the first of a series of Q&As on the recently published novel Lead With Respect by Freddy and Michael Ballé, Dan Jones explains why this book is a must-read.
CASE STUDY - Through the involvement of front line staff, Hartmann’s production plant near Barcelona is paving the way for an expansion into different markets and inspiring the adoption of lean across the multinational.
FEATURE - Develop your people if you want to develop a better (lean management) system in your business. This is the key message of this article, which looks at the role of management in an organization and in society.
CASE STUDY - Addressing failure cost and introducing a new quoting process are only two of the ways in which Dutch construction company Dura Vermeer is successfully achieving a lean transformation.
RESEARCH - This interesting study, based on 44 Volvo plants and 200 Volvo interviewees, looks at how the implementation of lean thinking influences a plant’s performance over time.
INTERVIEW - The General Manager of a Delphi plant in Hungary talks about the lean transformation the site went through and the challenges automotive suppliers face in this day and age.
COLUMN - In the third article of our series, the CEO of a healthcare institution in Catalonia, Spain, discusses the implementation of lean as a mindset that has its foundations in continuous improvement.
VIDEO - Dan Jones was one of the keynote speakers at this year's Lean Summit in The Netherlands. Here's a 15-minute excerpt of his talk, with some great insights into the state of lean thinking.
NEWS - Back from his annual trip to Shanghai, Anton Grütter, CEO of the Lean Institute Africa, shares a few interesting insights into the Chinese culture.
INTERVIEW - What lies at the core of kaizen activity? How has the concept of kaizen evolved over time? Planet Lean’s editor Roberto Priolo discusses these and other topics with kaizen expert Mark Hamel.
REVIEW - Michael and Freddy Ballé’s new novel, which came out this week, will help readers to understand what it really means to be a lean leader and respect people.
INTERVIEW - As the use of lean continues to grow in the service industry, questions abound on how this sector can use the principles and practices effectively.
FEATURE - Whether an organization pursues a lean transformation often depends on the early financial results - the low hanging fruit - it's able to achieve. This article offers a model to meet business needs while ensuring a transformation lasts.
COLUMN - A lean transformation is not just a prerogative of top management, but a goal to be shared across an organization. Here's a few thoughts on how I.T. people specifically can contribute to a turnaround.
INTERVIEW - Pierre Masai, CIO of Toyota Motor Europe, discusses IT across the company's operations in Europe, highlighting the importance of people engagement and experiments.
INTERVIEW – Planet Lean meets LEGO’s Ilona Takács to learn how the toy manufacturer looked at its corporate values to built a new, super-lean factory in eastern Hungary.
CASE STUDY - This article reports on the efforts that Erasmus Medical Center in the Netherlands has made to apply Theory of Constraints to patients' length of stay.
RESEARCH - Offering us a glimpse into how the human mind works and into Toyota's approach to people engagement, this article tells us how to create a better working environment for our employees.
FEATURE - Norman Faull, Director of Lean Institute Africa, talks about a supplier development project the institute took part in, and shares a few of the results achieved.
FEATURE - In his latest article, the author explains why pursuing human growth as part of our lean efforts is meaningless until we fully master our pull systems.
FEATURE - The author looks back at his many years with Toyota and shares some of the key lessons he learned along the way. What a unique company!
REVIEW - Roberto Priolo reviews the 14th Lean Management Conference, held earlier this month in Poland. With great presentations and speakers, the event left him with a lot to reflect on.
COLUMN - In the second article of our series, the director of an elementary school in Budapest tells us how using PDCA can help to improve education and provide students with the right skills.
FEATURE - Strategy deployment is fundamental to a lean transformation, but managers often struggle to understand its importance amid the day-to-day firefighting. This article will tell you how to make hoshin happen.
INTERVIEW - Having to adapt to changing customer needs, KLM Catering Services decided to turn to lean thinking, reducing its changeover times and recycling more.
FEATURE - In this essay, first appeared in his book Gemba Walks, Jim P. Womack describes the benefits of launching lean in a greenfield environment drawing from his experience volunteering in Central America.
COLUMN - Michael Ballé on why Toyota still inspires him in a way that no other organization can, and on the lessons lean thinkers can learn from the two most successful carmakers.
INTERVIEW - In this video interview, René Aernoudts, Michael Ballé and Dan Jones answer a few key questions on what's next for the lean movement.
INTERVIEW - New York City's public hospitals system leveraged lean principles and techniques to improve the quality of care and boost organizational performance.
RESEARCH - For most CEOs, working with a sensei is common practice. Yet, many questions remain on this role. This paper aims to bring clarity to the "sensei mystery".
FEATURE - Professor Dan Jones looks at the unique challenges the digital age presents the business community with, and explains how lean thinking can help us to effectively address them.
INTERVIEW – How do you communicate a consistent message to thousands of employees working across a fragmented and extremely diverse network? Catherine Blay, from French postal service La Poste, tells us.
COLUMN - For those working in the I.T. world, identifying waste can be tricky. However, starting by tackling over-production will help you to eliminate every other form of waste.
CASE STUDY - How does lean contribute to making Melbourne one of the world’s most liveable cities year after year? Denise Bennett explains the approach followed.
FEATURE - We are often told that employee resistance to change is natural, but it’s really just the result of a wrong approach to lean thinking. Learn to effectively engage people and change will follow.
COLUMN - In the first of a series of columns written by CEOs, John Bouthillon of PO Construction explains how lean has kept his company afloat through the recession.
COLUMN - What does lean do for people in your organization? This column explores how their way of thinking changes as a culture of continuous improvement and problem solving takes root.
INTERVIEW - Thanks to strong leadership support and an effective system to partner with private sector firms, Washington State is proving how successful lean production principles can be in a government setting.
FEATURE - Two weeks ago, the authors shared their thoughts on mindset. In part 2, they discuss how to grasp the true spirit of lean.
FEATURE - This set of guidelines will help you to understand how to properly structure your lean transformation, keeping into account the entire organization as it tries to embrace and manage change.
CASE STUDY - An approach based on Lean Daily Management System and experiments in a model area led an Italian manufacturer of combine-harvesters to become one of the leanest organizations in the Veneto region.
INTERVIEW - Håkan Borglund, CIO of Toyota Material Handling Europe, speaks with Planet Lean about Toyota principles and the role of lean IT at Toyota Material Handling.
FEATURE - We talk about “changing our mindset” all the time, but do we really understand what this means in the context of our lean transformation? This two-part article tries to understand what the spirit of lean really is.
FEATURE - The author addresses the ongoing debate on rewards and recognition, explaining how an optimal relationship between team members, team leaders and group leaders will influence motivation.
CASE STUDY - In the past two years, the Consorci Sanitari del Garraf near Barcelona experienced a lean turnaround. The author gives us an overview of the key building blocks of this transformation.
INTERVIEW - Jim Morgan looks back at his years at Ford Motor Company and talks about the challenges and opportunities of applying lean management ideas to new product development .
OPINION - How often have you heard the sentence, “Lean can’t work here – this isn’t Japan”? Probably more than you can remember. Here’s why national traits are simply another excuse for a failed attempt to change.
INTERVIEW - What does "leading through incompetence" mean? Peter Willats discusses the role of leadership in a lean management system and the evolution of lean thinking.
CASE STUDY - What does having a new “true north” mean? Following the merger with a large group, cancer center IOV is looking to seamlessly spread its lean management system to new operations and facilities.
FEATURE - What is the relationship between lean thinking and cost-cutting? Here's why you should focus on improvements as opposed to slashing a budget.
INTERVIEW - To really change, an organization must use lean management as a strategic asset rather than just a set of tools. In this interview, Art Byrne talks about rewarding people and the process of transforming companies.
FEATURE - Can a company be considered lean if its improvement efforts result in layoffs? The author answers this frequently asked question drawing from his own experience dealing with organizations.
CASE STUDY - Faced with high costs, low demand and growing competition from China, Turkish textile manufacturer Yesim managed to develop a competitive advantage by transforming its ways with lean thinking and increasing its focus on the customer
CASE STUDY - In November last year, a town in the West Midlands made the headlines after a survey named it the best place to live in the United Kingdom. Lean may not be directly responsible for the achievement, but there is little doubt it gave its contribution.
INTERVIEW - Anton Ulanov is the CEO of one of the largest agricultural businesses in Russia. He talks with PL about the application of lean at Agroholding Kuban, discussing the wider challenges and opportunities for lean in agriculture.
INTERVIEW – At the recent UK Lean Summit, we met the Head of Student Services of an English high school. We asked her about the interesting work the school is doing to improve the delivery of education to students with special needs using lean thinking.
