Month: May 2018

12 Articles

GA 217 | How Gemba Academy Practices Lean with Leslie Moles and Jennifer Scott

By Jessica Bush - May 31st, 2018

This week’s guests are our own Leslie Moles and Jennifer Scott. Leslie and Jennifer shared what it’s like  practicing lean at Gemba Academy, specifically how we leverage Toyota Kata. An MP3 version of this episode is avail

Instructions Aren’t Enough

By Steve Kane - May 25th, 2018

During a recent airline emergency, cabin pressure was lost and the oxygen masks dropped from the ceiling.  Passengers donned the masks, but not quite as instructed. Mobile phone videos of the incident showed many passengers wearing th

GA 216 | How to Reignite a Continuous Improvement Program with Casey Johnson

By Jessica Bush - May 24th, 2018

This week’s guest is Casey Johnson. Casey and Ron discussed the best ways to help an organization who has experienced a failed CI initiative get back on track. An MP3 version of this episode is available for download here. In thi

Compassion as a Competitive Advantage

By Jon Miller - May 21st, 2018

“The long-term value of a company is based on the speed and quality of its decision-making.” These are the words of Jeff Weiner, CEO of LinkedIn. He was speaking to the 2018 graduating business school students at the Univer

GA 215 | How to Reflect on Lessons Learned with Brian Buck

By Jessica Bush - May 17th, 2018

This week’s guest is Brian Buck. Brian reflected back on his journey thus far and shared some of the lessons he’s learned, including the importance of defining and maintaining standards. An MP3 version of this episode is av

Why Have Belts in Lean and Six Sigma?

By Jon Miller - May 14th, 2018

Motorola and the General Electric company made the greatest contributions to introduce Six Sigma across business in the 20th century. The deployment of Six Sigma often relied on “belts” of various colors, people who complet

Learn by Preparing to Teach

By Kevin Meyer - May 11th, 2018

Many studies have shown that one of the most effective ways to learn new material is not just to perform an activity with the new knowledge, but to teach it.  It’s the reason why several companies ask interview finalists for new

GA 214 | How to Set a Challenge with Mark Rosenthal

By Jessica Bush - May 10th, 2018

This week’s guest is consultant Mark Rosenthal. Mark shared some insights regarding the various components of Toyota Kata, including setting a challenge and determining a target condition. An MP3 version of this episode is availa

What’s the Right Way to Do a Gemba Walk?

By Jon Miller - May 7th, 2018

From time to time people ask me a variation of the question, “What’s the right way to do a gemba walk?” They want to see an outline of activities, a step-by-step process for planning, taking the walk and reflecting on

Lean Municipal Government Forum in Grand Rapids

New Videos: Lean Municipal Government Forum

By Kevin Meyer - May 4th, 2018

Is your city’s government using lean? If not, perhaps you should forward this to them! We just released a new video series with the presentations and tours from the Lean Municipal Government Forum recently held in Grand Rapids, M

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