lean visual management

Start with Kanban

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FeaturesAug 10, 2020
Michael Ballé
FEATURE – Using an effective example from every-day life, the author discusses why Kanban is the gateway to Lean Thinking – and not just a tool.

Four types of problems, in the management system

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FeaturesJul 2, 2020
Gustavo Adolfo Gomez Pineda
FEATURE – A lean management system is necessary to effectively run a business. Can Art Smalley’s four types of problems framework help such a system to focus on what’s really important?

Reimagining restaurants after Covid-19

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FeaturesMay 12, 2020
The Lean-n-Food Initiative
FEATURE – The future has never looked more uncertain for restaurants and cafes. The authors share a set of practical lean tips that can guide these organizations navigate the storm.

Fighting Covid-19 with lean healthcare

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FeaturesApr 3, 2020
Lean Healthcare Initiative
FEATURE - A Lean Global Network team of lean practitioners and coaches shares a set of lean healthcare tips hospitals can apply today to ready themselves for the peak of Covid-19 cases. 

The power of lean planning

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FeaturesMar 12, 2020
The TenneT team
FEATURE – A Dutch transmission system operator is using Lean Planning – built around the Last Planner System – to better manage its complex infrastructure projects.

Hoshin kanri in a picture

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FeaturesMar 9, 2020
Nestor Gavilan
FEATURE – Hoshin is a powerful management practice that aligns the work at different levels to a company’s strategic goals. The author offers a one-page visual summary.

Extracting waste from our process

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Case studiesJan 23, 2020
Rodnei Yogui
CASE STUDY – In a Brazilian insurance company, a team worked hard to streamline the revision of dental claims – a great example of Lean Thinking in an administrative process. 

Daily management in construction

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Case studiesDec 9, 2019
Renato Mariz et al
FEATURE – How lean daily management helped a Brazilian construction company to stabilize production in a tailing dam elevation project.

Practice makes perfect

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FeaturesNov 28, 2019
Dave Brunt
FEATURE – Much like lean management, attaining perfection in music requires constant practice. The author looks back at his musical past and at a recent Lean Global Network samba gig.

Safari, so good

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Case studiesNov 14, 2019
Sharon Visser
CASE STUDY – This company in Botswana has embraced lean thinking passionately to build the capacity and ability to deal with higher demand for its converted vehicles. The author tells us about their journey.

What is an Obeya?

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FeaturesSep 26, 2019
Roberto Priolo
FEATURE – In this roundup, we discuss the obeya room and use some of the best articles on the topic to explain why it’s such a powerful tool to drive improvement in your organization.

When lean takes off

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FeaturesSep 12, 2019
Catherine Chabiron
NOTES FROM THE GEMBA – The author visits the Parisian airport of Orly to learn about a pilot project (pun intended) that aims to tackle the late departure of flights using lean thinking.

Daily management in the ICU

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Case studiesAug 29, 2019
A. Fátima De Sousa, A. Matheus Basgal and R. Gouveia
CASE STUDY – Effectively deploying and executing your strategy requires mastering quick follow-ups at different levels of the organization – in other words, Daily Management.

What is 5S?

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FeaturesAug 22, 2019
Roberto Priolo
FEATURE – In this roundup, we look at one of the most important lean tools and how it is deployed in organizations by bringing together PL articles on the subject.

Understanding lean visual management tools

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FeaturesAug 20, 2019
Severino Abad
THE NAKED GEMBA – This useful article helps us to understand the different type of visual controls we can put in place, how they work and which ones to use to best convey our message.

Lean logistics for better customer service

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    string(1637) "While lean government and lean healthcare technically fall under this category, we consider lean service organizations to be those operating in areas like call centers, retail, hotels, restaurants, offices, banking, and so on. In such environments, there is a direct interaction with the customer, which should be seen as an opportunity to get real-time feedback on our service rather than a nuisance we have to deal with (if you have ever spoken with a customer care representative, you know what this means).

A common problem that practitioners trying to bring lean to services encounter is the difficulty to identify “the work” – whereas in manufacturing the product is in front of everyone’s eyes, in service organizations it is often hidden behind paperwork or a computer screen. Once the work is clearly visible, however, the opportunities for improvement are plentiful. To date, we have seen thousands of organizations striving to lean out the service they provide customers: from restaurants chains in the United States and China to a group of bakeries in Barcelona, from call centers to hotels, the application of lean services ideas can have an extraordinary impact on our economies. Especially if we consider that the service industry accounts for more than three-fifths of the global GDP and employs more than one-third of the global workforce.

Lean thinking is naturally a fit for the service industry, because of its focus on constantly delighting customers and on providing them with value-adding products."
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Case studiesAug 6, 2019
Alexandre Cardoso and Cauim Lopes
CASE STUDY – Logistics can be the key to achieving success and creating a competitive advantage in a company. This case study tells the story of a port terminal in Brazil that has used lean to achieve significant gains in managing its road flow.

Reflecting on our lean healthcare journey

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    string(1608) "Lean thinking may have been born in Toyota in the 1950s and 1960s, but it wasn’t until after the year 2000 that a few hospitals began to explore its application to the healthcare industry (lean healthcare). These pioneering organizations came together to share their stories at the first Global Lean Healthcare Summit in the UK in 2007, which in turn triggered many more experiments around the world. Since then, interest has kept growing.

Some fifteen years on, we have hundreds of examples to learn from, from clinics and departments through to entire hospitals and even whole hospital systems. Not all early experiments succeeded, and we are still a long way from making lean a widely recognized way of working across the industry.
Healthcare providers around the world still face huge challenges, as ageing populations and unhealthy lifestyles boost the demand for healthcare faster than the growth of incomes and tax revenues from the middle classes. At the same time, the quality of care has not improved as much as the quality of other services in the economy, which is why more and more healthcare organizations are turning to lean.

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Case studiesJun 27, 2019
Grey Dube
CASE STUDY – The CEO of a hospital in Johannesburg looks back to the last five years to reflect on a lean healthcare transformation that is creating positive outcomes for patients.

The path to a learning organization

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Case studiesJun 6, 2019
Steve Bell & Karen Whitley Bell
CASE STUDY – The story of this NGO shows how visualizing the work enables improvement and removes barriers among teams. It is a first, fundamental step towards a lean transformation.