May 31 2018
Stability Before Innovation | James Womack | The Lean Post
“Are we in the Lean Community lacking imagination and creativity? Indeed, do we take away the time and space for creativity and imagination from employees with our focus on standardizing work and our relentless process analysis […]? Or maybe this is backwards. Is it possible that […] a stable organization with stable processes enables successful innovation? […] Contrast Toyota’s methods with those of other companies generally believed to have brilliant, innovative ideas but no robust development, production, supplier management or even customer support processes, and which are short of funds. Not just Tesla but the whole VC-backed auto start-up industry come to mind.”
Sourced from The Lean Post
Michel Baudin‘s comments:
I don’t understand why Jim Womack restricts the discussion of stability and innovation to the car industry and the comparison with other companies to “VC-backed auto start-ups” that are short of funds. Toyota’s leaders grew the company by doing what they had to do to navigate the Japanese car industry. It is, in retrospect, a spectacularly successful model and worth studying. It is not, however, universally relevant.
Here in the heart of Silicon Valley, we view it as the worldwide hub of innovation, not the Nagoya area. Local entrepreneurs, VC-backed or not, have given us multiple generations of companies that are not exactly short of cash, like Hewlett Packard, Intel, Apple, eBay, Netflix, Google, Facebook,… Some of them are dabbling in the auto industry but most of their revenues come from elsewhere. It doesn’t make their practices and business models any less worthy of study than Toyota’s.
#innovation, #toyota, #siliconvalley
May 31, 2018 @ 2:20 pm
Why do you take Jim Womack seriously? He does not have even one Toyota-scale Lean implementation success to his credit. People have latched onto Lean in the false unrealistic belief that they will become successful like Toyota. There is Toyota and their Toyota Production System … and then there is Jim Womack, Lean and the Lean Enterprise Institute. I wish somebody could tell us what makes Amazon or Google as successful as they are. Do they give a toot for Lean? Or even for TPS? Or they have chosen to become who they are doing it their own wonderful innovative aggressive American way?
May 31, 2018 @ 5:08 pm
Hi All,
Toyota NOT INNOVATIVE???? Where did that come from? Maybe the company is not pioneering robotics like Honda or autonomous vehicles, as is the case in other high-profile automotive and technology-oriented organizations. NEVERTHELESS, I see in Toyota a substantive and continuous stream of innovation… in both its new product and process development and introduction processes, in its approach to environmental sustainability, in its approach to CI/OpsEx. That said, it seems reason to ask whether there is any valid reason or set of reasons to believe that this persistent (and impressive) ability to innovate is the byproduct of the organization’s demonstrated and on-going TRUE LEAN THINKING AND BEHAVING ability?
To my way of thinking, I believe that unique ability does plays a significant role in making the on-going pursuit of INNOVATION across multiple mission-critical dimensions possible. Why might that be the case? Well, first and foremost of my list of reasons would be its consistently efficient and effective operations. By virtue of their existence and on-going evolution, they allow for more resources (on a consistent basis) to be channeled into initiatives that are intended to help define and/or refine the organization’s future. A good (and recent) example of INNOVATION at work within Toyota involves the development and production of the Lexus high-performance “LFA” vehicle. If you’re not already familiar with it, that’s likely because Toyota holds most – if not all – of its innovation cards close to its vest.
IF interested in LEARNING more about this initiative, here’s a link to a National Geographics documentary that was produced in or about 2014 that provides details regarding that effort.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N4OfY9EYuUg
[Note: I believe that this documentary serves as good evidence of Toyota being an organization that is ready, willing, and able to introduce both RISK AND UNCERTAINTY into its existing operations in order to achieve Kaizen-scale breakthroughs in any number of mission-critical arenas.]
June 1, 2018 @ 5:27 am
Who is saying that Toyota is not innovative? Jim Womack is not, and I’m not. All I am saying is that we should not look only at a car maker as a benchmark of innovativeness. I brought up Silicon Valley startups but I could also have brought up toilet maker Toto. They took a product that had not changed much in centuries and turned into the washlet. Then they designed tankless toilets to take up less space in small apartments. Then then designed silent-flush toilets for luxury hotels. And then a more slippery coating for toilet bowls… To the extent they are willing to share, we could study how they went about it.
June 1, 2018 @ 3:34 am
Going back to the headline ‘Stability before Innovation’, I understand the sequence to be:
Innovation > standardisation > kaizen > innovation etc. An old (but nice) illustration of this was car painting (sorry its automotive!)
Body tops and sides are painted by spinning bells in fixed positions, but door shuts and awkward areas painted by hand. Buy a 3-axis robot to spray the awkward areas (innovation – something new and different). Standardise pattern to ensure it follows same optimum route around vehicle …but person still has to open and close doors to allow access for robot arm. Kaizen is to fit peg on robot arm which can be inserted to window glass apertures – robot can open and shut doors for itself.
PS In my consulting days I usually found that consultants who had actually worked for / in Toyota drove different brands of car!
June 1, 2018 @ 12:43 pm
Hi Michel,
Based on the implied existence of a relationship (i.e., causation vs correlation) between the level of “stability” [of an an organization’s operations] and its level of innovation, it certainly seems as though there is interest in exactly how Toyota might or might not be performing [innovation wise] in comparison to other organizations… both inside and outside the automotive realm. What gives credence to this impression is the apparent concern being expressed in the Womack’s posting, or what’s being presented of it…
“Are we in the Lean Community lacking imagination and creativity? Indeed, do we take away the time and space for creativity and imagination from employees with our focus on standardizing work and our relentless process analysis […]? Or maybe this is backwards. Is it possible that […] a stable organization with stable processes enables successful innovation? […]
I agree the discussion could be focused on the innovativeness of a nut and bolt manufacturer, but doing so would certainly seem to me to be out of context. As such, what companies like Toto are doing to reinvent the toilet sans any “lean context” seems irrelevant. And to my way of thinking, comparing/contrasting the level of innovation in high-tech companies (i.e. Silicon Valley and/or VC-backed start-ups) and companies in the automotive industry is a bit like comparing/contrasting apple and oranges. Ergo, my impression that there is some concern over Toyota’s level of innovation.