Jon Miller, Author at Gemba Academy

Lighting a Candle for Energy Sustainability

By Jon Miller - March 6th, 2009

There was a great teaching moment this week. As we were walking around the shop floor at the end of the day, the shift ended and people began streaming out of the factory. Soon the lights began to shut off. We were left alone, in the d

What’s All the Fuss About A3 Thinking?

By Jon Miller - March 3rd, 2009

Jim had a good point in his comment: I don’t understand the excitement about this so-called A3 thinking. Root cause analysis has been around for decades, so has five whys (at least since the very early 1980s.) As for hypothesis t

Porque é que esta água fria?

By Jon Miller - March 2nd, 2009

That is how the sun sets over the Amazon in the evening. But today let’s talk about how the water comes out of the shower in the morning, which is to say cold. When this happens one is faced with three choices: wait until the wat

Guest Post: Should You Display Standardized Work Sheets at the Workstation?

By Jon Miller - March 1st, 2009

by Franck Demarest When discussing this subject with many people, I often encounter the dilemma about the location of standardised work sheet meaning either close to the line or in a cupboard in management office. About which standard

Taiichi Ohno’s Three Lessons for the New Toyota President

By Jon Miller - February 26th, 2009

Yesterday Kevin Meyer provided a useful summary of how Toyota is getting back to basics, as described in the Wall Street Journal article titled “A Scion Drives Toyota Back to Basics”. Here are the key takeaways from both so

Drive and Dedication Power the TBP Process

By Jon Miller - February 23rd, 2009

As a companion to the problem solving funnel or the 8 step approach of the problem solving process at Toyota, there is a set of principles that guide thought and action. Together these make up the newly described way of working called

TBP: Toyota Business Practice

By Jon Miller - February 22nd, 2009

Are you interested in practical problem-solving and continuous improvement methodologies? In this blog post, we explore the Toyota Business Practice (TBP) and its relationship with PDCA and A3 thinking. We also take a closer look at th

Edwards Deming, Supply Chain Visionary?

By Jon Miller - February 20th, 2009

This is my contribution to the Supply Chain Anti-trends Cross Blogging series organized by Michael Lamoureux of Sourcing Innovation. The Strategic Sourcerer contributed with a farewell to golden parachuted fat cat CEOs and two other ar

A Question About Kaizen

By Jon Miller - February 18th, 2009

Here is a question for you about kaizen: You have two continuous improvement systems; one which invests in 10 brilliant people each solving one $250,000 problem per year or another system which invests in 1,000 average people solving o

Guest Post: Daily Lean Marketing Speech

By Jon Miller - February 18th, 2009

Hello, I am Franck Demarest, 32 years old. I am French and have been working in the continuous improvement field in the automotive industry. I have been in Tier 1 ((JIT Production Responsible, 6 Sigma Black Belt and Lean Facilitator) d

Free Introduction to Lean Manufacturing Video

By Jon Miller - February 17th, 2009

This is the first video from Gemba Academy. We will create both free content and subscription-based content with interactive content and guides you can download to check your learning. This 10-minute video is on YouTube. Please visit w

10 Ways that Kaizen Develops Better Leaders

By Jon Miller - February 15th, 2009

Here are ten ways that kaizen develops better leaders. #1 Attention The leader well-heeled in kaizen notices the small things and is bothered by them if they seem abnormal. They pay attention to details. #2 Vision The practice of kaize

7 Ways to Reduce Energy Cost

By Jon Miller - February 13th, 2009

Earlier this week Ron Pereira wrote about 7 ways to reduce costs at the Lean Six Sigma Academy blog. He ht a nerve and kicked up quite storm of more than a dozen comments when he suggested that frequent flyer miles be saved by the comp

The Lean Workplace as Classroom

By Jon Miller - February 12th, 2009

The the Harvard Business Review article Decoding the DNA of the Toyota Production System Kent Bowen and Steven Spear describe Toyota as a “community of scientists” based on the their approach to management. Specifically, th

Where Did Value Stream Mapping Come From?

By Jon Miller - February 10th, 2009

Harish Jose asked about value stream mapping: Is this “tool” used and abused by lean manufacturing practitioners? Why is this tool not explained in Ohno, Monden or Shingo’s books? Shingo does talk about the process an

Celebrating Over 500 Years of Lean Thinking

By Jon Miller - February 9th, 2009

Since 1997 the Lean Enterprise Institute (www.lean.org) has helped to popularize and spread lean thinking worldwide through book publishing, seminars, conferences and many other ways. LEI has been especially generous in sharing

The Top 10 Titans of TPS

By Jon Miller - February 8th, 2009

Sean asked an interesting question: Who would you consider to be the titans of the TPS? Certainly, there was Ohno and Shingo, but is there anyone else that should be on the list? I like to connect the history to people because it shows

Don’t Touch the Fish. Because…

By Jon Miller - February 6th, 2009

The last time I was in Japan, I was amused by a sound byte on the radio news. The Tsukiji fish market decided to close their doors to visitors because, “No matter how many times we tell them, they don’t listen.” In th

Kaizen Skills of an Operations Leader

By Jon Miller - February 4th, 2009

Stephen Ondoro is a newly appointed operations leader who asked: “I have been chosen as an operations leader yet it has not been clarified as to the role and scope. What kaizen skills do i need to lead my team successfully? Pleas

3 More Practical Ways to Show Respect for Humanity

By Jon Miller - February 3rd, 2009

One of the underlying principles of the Toyota Production System is the founder’s desire to instill in Toyota’s workers a deeply spiritual sense of respect for humanity in the course of operating a manufacturing company. Al

How to Arrive at the Vital Few

By Jon Miller - February 2nd, 2009

Alex asked a question “How do organizations determine the ‘vital few’? Any small number of activities that have the largest impact in relation to business planning, launching an TPS implementation project or simply ge

The Correct Sequence for Doing 5S?

By Jon Miller - January 29th, 2009

Harish was reading the archives and asked a question: Traditionally (Hirano or Ohno’s Work Place Management) 5S is in a specific order – Sort, Set (Straighten), Shine (Spic & Span), Standardize and Sustain (if needed).

Finding Time Values for Standard Work

By Jon Miller - January 27th, 2009

Thanks to Gary Tucker for a question regarding standard work and standardized time values: How do you get your time values and how do you know that they are standardized? You sure can’t just take any observed time. There are all

How to Stretch 90 Second of Work to 2,700 Seconds

By Jon Miller - January 26th, 2009

Sometimes it seems like the most difficult part of helping some companies implement lean is sorting out the various legal and purchasing details to finally get a signed contract. While the whole process can seem bureaucratic and non va

5 Why? vs. Why Not?

By Jon Miller - January 24th, 2009

The Toyota Why Not website came my way via Twitter. It’s an interesting distraction. The best part is the birds chirping. I actually looked for an open window until I realized that birds don’t chirp in January in Seattle. T

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