Each month new articles, book reviews, and other content are added to the Superfactory website. The new content is featured in the monthly e-newsletter which goes out to 50,000 subscribers worldwide, and we will also post a monthly heads-up on this blog.
New content in March includes:
The featured article is by Bob Emiliani and is titled Putting Lean Into Orbit. The following is a brief excerpt, and you can read the entire article here.
Last January Jim Womack sent an e-letter to the Lean community titled "Beyond Lean", meaning that it was time for the Lean community to move beyond its benchmark company, Toyota. Perhaps so, but there is still much to learn from them, including how Lean thinking is not actually part of anyone's DNA. Lean leaders can make decisions that are just as dumb as anyone else. While it may be appropriate to move beyond Toyota, we must remain firmly fixed on the "Continuous Improvement" and "Respect for People" principles, practice Lean management in a non-zero-sum manner, and achieve flow in demand-driven buyers' markets for goods and services.
In his e-letter to the Lean community, Jim said:
"Lean methods for product development, fulfillment from order to delivery, supply stream management, customer support, and management of the overall enterprise are now well known and widely accepted in concept. We’ve won the battle of ideas on how to operate and improve processes. But creating management systems and organizations that can practice (not just preach) lean every day year after year turns out to be a lot harder. "
While the last sentence is accurate, I very much disagree that Lean methods are "now well known and widely accepted in concept" and that "we've won the battle of ideas." If that were true - even only in concept - there would be a year of headlines in The Wall Street Journal about the death of conventional management (the editorial page would go berserk); neoclassical economists would torch their shops and take the insurance money; Yasuhiro Monden, Art Byrne, Gary Kaplan, Brian Maskell, and Cliff Ransom would become full-time analysts on CNBC; and every course in business schools worldwide would undergo massive revision.
The featured book this month is The Lean Machine by Dantar Oosterwal. The following is a brief summary, click here for more information.
There may be no more iconic American brand than Harley-Davidson. But like many storied companies, Harley has had to evolve to stay on top and at times its very existence has been threatened. Practically extinct in the mid-1980's, the company began a miraculous turnaround centered on a product development and manufacturing revolution. With dramatic improvements in efficiency and bottom-line results, Harley returned to dominance. At the core of this incredible story was author Dantar Oosterwal, who brings the transformation of Harley-Davidson to life in "The Lean Machine". Filled with crucial lessons for any product development environment, it's also a great American success story.
Our partner Gemba Academy is celebrating its one year anniversary by running a promotion. During the month of
March the first 500 subscribers to an online training video package will also receive the equivalent DVD package at no additional cost. As an example, with the Complete Lean Package of 73 video modules this promotion is worth $795! Learn more here.
We continually update the other major sections of the website, including:
- PowerPoint Presentations: Over 115 downloadable PowerPoint presentations on lean manufacturing, lean leadership, lean industries, quality, lean enterprise, and safety concepts. Special promotion: purchase a Package or Bundle of presentations and receive the Gemba Academy Lean Starter Package DVD ($97 value) at no cost.
- Factory Toolbox: Almost 300 downloadable forms, procedure templates, assessments, and tools to help you not reinvent the wheel.
- Events Calendar: a listing of lean excellence seminars, workshops, training, and conferences worldwide
- Topic Information: Summaries and resources on over 40 enterprise excellence topics.
- Virtual Factory Tours: Web and streaming video tours of over 100 factories.
For all you LinkedIn junkies, we have created a LinkedIn group for Superfactory, which now has over 3,500 members. Join the group to
network with other Superfactory enthusiasts and to show our logo on your profile. If you haven't explored LinkedIn, check it out to see why over 17 million professionals use it for networking.
We are always looking for new articles and other content. Contact us via the Superfactory website if you would like to contribute to our knowledge base.