2007 | Page 4 of 45 | Gemba Academy

What is the Standard?

By Jon Miller - November 6th, 2007

A problem was brought to my attention today. Some of our consultants are not submitting expense reports on time, causing us to be unable to bill clients on time. Simply put, some people are keeping other people from doing their job. Th

Free Videos on Lean Healthcare, Toyota Production System

By Jon Miller - November 5th, 2007

Here are a pair of free videos on YouTube. The first is titled A Quick Introduction to Lean Thinking and it is brought to you by the NHS group Institute for Innovation and Improvement. Some of the graphics and examples of Lean in healt

Three of the Lessons Learned from Gemba’s 2007 Hoshin Kanri

By Jon Miller - November 4th, 2007

We are in our pre-planning phase for our 2008 hoshin kanri (policy deployment) here at Gemba. That means we start by reflecting on 2007 and the progress made so far. Without airing too much dirty laundry, here are three of the lessons

Why a Kaizen Newspaper is Called a Kaizen Newspaper

By Jon Miller - November 1st, 2007

The kaizen newspaper is tool used to perform visual management on the process of continuous improvement itself. Many people who have not been introduced to the kaizen newspaper through kaizen events or as part of a program of team-base

Thank You, Thank You, Sam-I-Am

By Jon Miller - October 30th, 2007

One of my favorite philosophers is Theodor Geisel, a man whose illustrated stories continue to entertain and speaks to children and adults alike. Anyone continuous improvement professional who has read his “Green Eggs and HamR

Stumbling on the Lesser Category of Obstacles

By Jon Miller - October 29th, 2007

The important and influential ideas of W. Edwards Deming include a System of Profound Knowledge, 14 Points for Management, and the 7 Deadly Diseases. While Deming was not an innovator of practical tools to implement Lean manufacturing,

Do You Understand the System of Profound Knowledge?

By Jon Miller - October 28th, 2007

W. Edwards Deming said “without theory there is no learning” while Taiichi Ohno said “understanding means doing.” Deming left a great legacy with his Theory of Profound Knowledge which if followed allows the way

Two Types of Kaizen

By Ron Pereira - October 28th, 2007

The word kaizen is fast becoming a buzz word galore. You will hear about how people are “doing kaizen” or running a big “kaizen event” next week. Many times folks are in fact executing kaizen’s in an att

Seeing Problems for What they Are, Or Lean Insights from G.K. Chesterton

By Jon Miller - October 25th, 2007

G.K. Chesterton was an extremely clever early 20th century writer who used many twists of phrase to make his points. His style of thinking and the points he makes at times makes me wonder if members of the Toyoda family read and were i

Alignment of People, Process and Purpose

By Jon Miller - October 24th, 2007

A few years ago during a visit to the gemba of high volume manufacturing client, I found a good case study in a disjointed Lean implementation. There was a lack of alignment between how management was leading the Lean effort (providing

Year: 2007