Gemba Academy

The 5W1H of 5 Why

By Jon Miller - July 30th, 2008

There is a wise saying that “Knowledge means nothing without wisdom to profit by it.” It’s not who we are, who we know, or what we know… it’s what we do with that knowledge. We all have tremendous power to

It’s a Girl!

By Ron Pereira - July 27th, 2008

“Children too are a gift from the LORD, the fruit of the womb, a reward.” ~Psalm 127:3 Yesterday my family was blessed with the arrival of our 4th child, a baby girl. While the births of all my children have been amazing, this one

Ambiguous Visual Controls: Stop on Green

By Jon Miller - July 24th, 2008

One of the small remaining delights in foreign travel after 15 years of it is the discovery of yet another laughably ambiguous visual control. Something about them tickles the sense of humor that has been punished by jet lag and questi

Alice in Chains and The Soft Zone

By Ron Pereira - July 22nd, 2008

A few weeks ago I was hanging out with some of my neighbors. The kids were playing, the wives were talking, and the men were drinking a few beers while playing the bean bag game. You know the one… where you try to toss bean bags onto

The Lean Journey and the Long Path

By Jon Miller - July 22nd, 2008

A journey is used as a common metaphor for lean deployment. In fact many speak of the implementation of the Toyota Production System and its many non-production sub-processes as “the lean journey”. As a pursuit of zero waste, it is

Should we Keep to the Middle?

By Ron Pereira - July 20th, 2008

Here’s a list of principles worthy of our attention as we start the week. Carefully observe oneself and one’s situation, carefully observe others, and carefully observe one’s environment. Seize the initiative in whatever you unde

Three Ways to Draw Future State Value Stream Maps

By Jon Miller - July 16th, 2008

A value stream map is a diagram showing the flow of the material, goods or services and also the supporting information flow. It is typically drawn in a clockwise fashion beginning at the customer in the two o’clock position, bac

Laying the Foundation: Part 2

By Ron Pereira - July 15th, 2008

Tonight we’ll wrap up our series on how to lay down a strong foundation such that your continuous improvement initiatives not only survive… but flourish. In part 1 of the series we talked about creating tension, ensuring our effort

Laying the Foundation: Part 1

By Ron Pereira - July 14th, 2008

Tonight, I’d like to share some tips for how we might all go about laying down a rock solid foundation in an effort to ensure our continuous improvement bear real fruit. The most obvious foundational tip I can offer is to respect peo

Planting Seeds

By Ron Pereira - July 13th, 2008

What can we learn about continuous improvement from the person Christian’s call the King of King’s, Lord of Lord’s, and The Great I AM? Lots. Let’s start in the book of Matthew. And he spoke to them at length in parable

We Do Not Make What We Do Not Sell: No More Trucks in Indiana

By Jon Miller - July 13th, 2008

It is no mistake to say that the people at the top of Toyota, the President, CEO, Chairman and other executives all thoroughly understand production control. How many CEOs in the world can say this? In a word we might say that in TPS t

Kaizen Song: Mr. Pareto

By Jon Miller - July 10th, 2008

This one was inspired by hearing Mr. Roboto on the radio shortly after helping a team make good use of Mr. Pareto’s chart and related 80-20 principle during a lean implementation planning session. What else rhymes with “kil

Is Batching Always Bad?

By Ron Pereira - July 9th, 2008

I was recently skimming the archives of one of my favorite “blogging” blogs – Problogger – when I read something that stopped me dead in my tracks. The thing that slammed me into this proverbial brick wall was an article titled

Is it Kaizen or Just Good Management?

By Jon Miller - July 9th, 2008

One of the risks, or should we say unintended consequences of a successful lean implementation is that people become unhappy when “there are no more problems to solve”. This seemed like an odd statement when it was first heard spok

Less Talking, More Action

By Ron Pereira - July 8th, 2008

“Too many words. Let them just see what we do.” -Blessed Mother Teresa This is an odd quote for a blog that primarily depends on the written word in order to communicate. With this in mind, I’ll keep this post short and sweet. In

The Leisure to do Kaizen

By Jon Miller - July 7th, 2008

The most difficult thing about sustaining a lean implementation to the point where it becomes an indelible part of the way of working is not about understanding the techniques and methods of the Toyota Production System, not about brin

The Art of Instruction

By Ron Pereira - July 7th, 2008

“I never teach my pupils; I only attempt to provide the conditions in which they can learn.” ~Albert Einstein Last night we discussed two different learning theories – entity and incremental. I read about these theories i

Two Approaches to Learning

By Ron Pereira - July 6th, 2008

Have you ever watched the movie Searching for Bobby Fisher? It’s the one about the child prodigy chess player. Well the child, Josh Waitzkin, is all grown up now and has written a book called The Art of Learning. I am not done with t

Happy 4th of July!

By Ron Pereira - July 4th, 2008

“Freedom has its life in the hearts, the actions, the spirit of men and so it must be daily earned and refreshed – else like a flower cut from its life-giving roots, it will wither and die.” ~Dwight D. Eisenhower A me

The Ultimate Productivity System: Zen to Done

By Ron Pereira - July 2nd, 2008

Leo Babauta is the founder of one of the most popular blogs around called Zen Habits (almost 60,000 subscribers as of this article). While he doesn’t write about lean manufacturing, per se, he does touch on many lean philosophies lik

Turn off the Lights

By Ron Pereira - July 1st, 2008

Walmart is in the news with their new logo. Something that isn’t getting as much press is a new thing Walmart is also beginning to do in their stores… turn off the lights. Where are the waffles? I was recently in my local

Kaizen: Do What You Can Do Today

By Jon Miller - June 30th, 2008

Some of the best kaizen ideas can be truly very little things. It is the accumulation of small changes daily that give us the habit of coming up with creative ideas. If you don’t have on in your mind already, within the next few

Ban the Stop Watch!

By Ron Pereira - June 30th, 2008

Allow me to introduce Joe, the plant Industrial Engineer. Joe is a nice boy fresh out of college. On this particular day old Joe comes popping out of his cubicle in his Dockers and white polo shirt holding a clip board and stop watch.

Ambiguous Visual Controls: No Running in the Airplane

By Jon Miller - June 29th, 2008

The more you look the more you see ambiguous visual controls. Some are well-intentioned, while others appear to be half-hearted attempts to comply with some bureaucratic requirements. Others hint at hidden efficiencies or inefficiencie

Jedi Kaizen: Is the Force with You?

By Jon Miller - June 28th, 2008

The type of quick improvements or “just do it kaizen” is sometimes called JDI. Recently I heard it pronounced “jedi kaizen” in passing. The jedi are a group of monks in the Star Wars series. As monks, they live

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