November 2005 | Page 2 of 2

In Defense of Mr. Rogers

By Jon Miller - November 13th, 2005

I’ve been enjoying Bill Waddell’s tough-and-straight postings lately on the Evolving Excellence blog. I had to stop and think awhile after reading last week’s posting titled Ohno, Shingo and Bobby Knight. I have a lot

Skill Matrix Enables Suggestion System

By Jon Miller - November 10th, 2005

We received a call from a kaizen facilitator who was concerned that their suggestion system was losing steam. We went to their Gemba to find out what was going wrong. This company was receiving plenty of suggestions. They had copies of

Lean Government Update Nov. 9, 2005

By Jon Miller - November 9th, 2005

New Lean Government Champion in Mesa, Arizona A new potential Lean government champion hit our radar today with the appointment of Christopher J. Brady as the City Manager of Mesa, Arizona. Based on the azcentral.com article Mr. Brady

Eric’s Japan Lean Benchmarking Trip, 2

By Jon Miller - November 8th, 2005

The impressions of what he saw are still strong in Eric’s mind several weeks after returning from his Lean manufacturing benchmarking trip to Japan: “The visit to Toyota was everything I expected, which was amazing. We firs

Recommended Book: China, Inc. by Ted Fishman

By Jon Miller - November 7th, 2005

I had some trans-Pacific airplane time recently so I read China, Inc. by Ted C. Fishman. It’s not without flaws but it gives good context and perspective about China to much of the news and views you hear on China in the media to

Genchi Gembutsu in Aceh, Indonesia

By Jon Miller - November 3rd, 2005

Indonesia was not high on the list of places I thought I would read about an example of Lean government. So I was pleasantly surprised to find an article on the front page of the November 2, 2005 Wall Street Journal titled After the Ts

Client tells Gemba: “We’re Wasting Our Money by Paying You”

By Jon Miller - November 2nd, 2005

Earlier this week I had a chance to join one of our consultants on a follow up visit to one of our clients. We were there for a Lean transformation progress check and to make training and kaizen project plans for 2006. We reviewed thei

Month: November 2005