Management

Sep 19 2015

Gemba, and Genchi-Genbutsu

Gemba, and Genchi-Genbutsu are commonly used terms in the Lean community, with many web pages and blog posts purportedly explaining what they mean. For example, the following confused and simplistic statement is what you find on Wikipedia:

Genchi Genbutsu (現地現物) means “go and see” and it is a key principle of the Toyota Production System. It suggests that in order to truly understand a situation one needs to go to gemba (現場) or, the ‘real place’ – where work is done.

What are we actually talking about?  Continue reading…

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Sep 15 2015

About Strategy, Tactics, and Lean

Carl von Clausewitz, writer on military strategy and tactics
Carl von Clausewitz, writer on military strategy and tactics

Originally “the art of the general,” strategy is about which armies or fleets you deploy where and for what purpose. It goes hand in hand with tactics, which is the way each unit then engages the enemy. Always fond of military metaphors, business people have chosen to use  the term”strategy”  for their plans and decisions on products or services, markets, promotion methods, technology, organization, and financing. To Harvard Business School’s Michael Porter “the essence of [business] strategy is choosing what not to do.”

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toyotaway_img01

Sep 9 2015

“Wisdom” and “Continuous Improvement” in the Toyota Way

Toyota’s Japanese documents and their English versions often mean different things. Recently, looking at the Japanese version of The Toyota Way 2001, I was surprised to find that what is translated into English as “Continuous Improvement” is “Chie to Kaizen” (知恵と改善), which means “Wisdom and Continuous Improvement.” In the English version, “Wisdom” was not only dropped from the main header, it appears nowhere. Continue reading…

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ships-crossing-past-the-Golden-Gate

Sep 1 2015

Improving Versus Getting Others To Improve

Managers’ near universal reaction to the challenge of improvement is that their own operations are already run as effectively and efficiently as possible, given external constraints, including fickle customers, unreliable suppliers, local labor laws, worn-out equipment, a rickety transportation infrastructure, and the weather. The internal problems are so puny compared to the external ones that it would be futile to address them. Who cares about doubling operator productivity when labor costs are 5% of the cost of goods sold? Why should we reduce production lead times to one day when component purchasing lead times are four months?

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Aug 25 2015

What’s Wrong With the Rote Application of Lean Tools?

There is more to playing the piano than practicing scales, but you can’t get there unless you do practice scales. Likewise, there is more to Lean than tools, but you need the tools. They are not sufficient, but they are necessary. Unless you learn them, you are depriving yourself of the benefits of clever tricks, methods, and analytical tools developed over 65 years. Each one doesn’t necessarily take long to learn, but would to reinvent, and you don’t have that time.

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Aug 8 2015

Is there such a thing as managerial DNA? | LinkedIn

Scientific and technical terms are frequently used metaphorically in business, in ways that don’t always make sense. Companies, nowadays, are commonly described as having certain practices, “in their DNA,” and you hear discussions of “changing their DNA.”As is known to anyone who has taken High School biology or watched a recent cop show on TV,  the one thing you can’t change is your DNA. We each have our own version, formed at conception and replicated in every cell of our body.

Sourced through Scoop.it from: www.linkedin.com

See on Scoop.it – lean manufacturing

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