When Taiichi Ohno first came to tiny Showa Manufacturing in 1984, mighty Toyota was just at the end of a thirty-five-year process of diffusing lean thinking across the Toyota Group within Japan and was just beginning to spread it across the world, beginning at the NUAUNII plant in California. Two of the basic lean concepts … Read more

A key problem—one faced by many Japanese firms today—was that Showa’s market strategy was at odds with its new production methods. Showa had discovered how to build a complete boiler in four days (compared with sixteen to twenty weeks) and how to build all boilers to special order without paying a significant production cost premium, … Read more

But talking to each other has been a key German weakness. As one looks at the educational system, at every level the emphasis is on deep but narrow skills for technical operations rather than horizontal systems thinking to pull all operations together. And this is reflected in career paths which have been up narrow chimneys. … Read more

As always, Chihiro Nakao’s initial foray into Porsche was a theatrical tour de force. When he arrived for his first visit in the fall of 1992, he insisted that Wiedeking immediately accompany him to the assembly plant. After walking through the door and looking at the stacks of inventory, he asked in a loud voice: … Read more

The original Pratt & Whitney Company was created before the American Civil War by Francis Pratt and Amos Whitney. These “Yankee mechanics” learned their trade as inside contractors at Samuel Colt’s armoury, opened in Hartford, Connecticut, in 1855. They produced the individual parts needed for Colt pistols and rifles, hiring their own workforce but using … Read more

The type of activities which people all over the world consistent report most rewarding—that is, whit make them feel best – involve a clear objective, a need for concentration so intense that no attention is left over, lack of interruptions and distractions clear and immediate feedback on progress toward the objective, and a sense of … Read more

To get continuous-flow systems to flow for more than a minute or two at a time, every machine and every worker must be completely “capable.” That is, they must always be in proper condition to run precisely when needed and every part made must be exactly right. By design, flow systems have an everything-works-or-nothing-works quality … Read more

[…] the first step is to mine bauxite in Australia. Although the ore could in principle be mined in small amounts and sent along to the next step within a few minutes of the receipt of an order, the mining machinery is truly massive and the actual process involves scooping out millions of tons of … Read more