Lean Selling Anti-Lean?

[tweetmeme source=”leanisgood” service=”ow.ly” only_single=false]In the last few months I’ve been coming across articles from Toyota Material Handling touting their AGV or automated guided vehicles.  This particular article in ThomasNet News describes showing off the total system.

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Lean Haiku – A Raised Hand

Photo by Viqi French under Creative Commons Attribution

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I refuse to give up on something after one try so here is my second attempt at lean haiku.  If you missed my first try here it is with a brief explanation of my motivation.  This one is called a raised hand.

he raises his hand

nobody cares to answer

this place really blows!

CFO Magazine – Lean Health Care

Keen to Be Lean | CFO Magazine | Josh Hyatt, Contributing Editor

[tweetmeme source="leanisgood" service="ow.ly"]Most articles on lean in the mainstream press don’t portray lean fairly or adequately.  Many times it is innocent ignorance on the part of the journalist.  The lean paradigm is a broad, complex, yet subtle to the uninitiated.  Most journalists are too ignorant of the paradigm to adequately convey it to a broad audience.  Some just do lazy work and miss-portray lean as cost cutting method that relies on squeezing more out of fewer people.  The article linked above isn’t one of those.  Hyatt does a decent job bringing lean news to his audience.

Leadership for Lean – Humility

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In  a Q&A in Harvard Business School’s Working Knowledge, Harvard Business Professor William George, author of 7 Lessons for Leading in Crisis, talks about seven leadership lessons for weathering crisis.  It’s a good read.  One of the lessons is, “Face reality, starting with yourself.”

Lean thinkers will recognize this as hansei or self-reflection.  Professor George argues that leaders have to be humble enough to admit weaknesses and flaws that they see.

Lean Haiku – Fujio Cho in the Gemba

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When I was in elementary school I couldn’t stand poetry.  I didn’t mind reading it, but I absolutely despised having to write poems.  I found it bothersome trying to make everything rhyme.  Then the teacher taught me about haiku. 

Lean Health Care – Humble Before People

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When I decided to blog I made a rule that I would NOT post on lean health care for two reasons: I have never done health care, it has only been done to me, and there are other blogs that are prolific and profound on the subject (here’s one.)  But rules were meant to be broken, right?

The story begins with Fred Holliday who goes to the ER for pain in his lower chest / back.  It turns out