Bad profits, as aptly defined by marketing guru Fred Reichheld, are those gained by charging customers for things that they aren’t happy to pay for. Reichheld cites examples we all know too well – bank service charges, airline change fees, telecom roaming charges, hidden fees on mutual funds, you name it. But what about profits… read more.

In the past few weeks, I’ve had some great conversations about Lean leadership with Sam MacPherson, organizer and chief evangelist of the upcoming Summit on Lean Leadership in Jacksonville. (October 5 and 6, 2015) What Sam has found out is that it takes more than Lean competencies to make a Lean leader, hence the distinction… read more.

It’s tempting to look at CEO competencies the way we would look at the skills of a quarterback, and many articles and books try to codify the basket of capabilities that great leaders bring to the table. I initially tried to do that when I wrote The Lean CEO, but when it came to nailing… read more.

Dropped by Seattle on July 20 to visit Northwest Center, and was struck by how far the ideas of respect for people and “bring the work to the worker” can go. As some will remember from my book The Lean CEO, Northwest Center hires people who are commonly described as disabled. At Northwest Center they… read more.

When leaders have the courage to admit they don’t know, this can have a transforming influence on an organization. Let’s face it – when a senior executive walks onto the shop floor, or the hospital ward, or the customer service department, the words “I don’t know” aren’t news. The front line workers already know what… read more.

After the miracle of Toyota was introduced to the world, the story line goes, the business world got the tool part, but not the people part.  I think there’s a missing piece in that narrative. The clue is in the article “The Age of Consumer Capitalism” (Harvard Business Review, Jan, 2010) by Canadian business guru… read more.

The wrong-headed approach to lean, characterized by the desire for short-term gain only, is widely reviled in the lean community. Leaders, it seems, want to get the benefits of lean without committing to the hard work that a lean transformation requires. I think the conversation about committing to lean is contingent on a much larger… read more.

In his fascinating Industry Week article How American Workers Became Disengaged, Michael Collins paints an alarming picture of the steady erosion of worker pay over the past 50 years. Nobody can deny that this is a major factor in demotivating workers, and the subsequent decline in productivity. It gets worse, though. A more subtle aspect… read more.

Steve Brenneman of Aluminum Trailer Company has become widely known for taking lean to his entire enterprise, and the results are clearly visible in his plant and offices. Although ATC hosts frequent gemba walks, the message isn’t getting through to the CEOs. In this 5-minute clip, Steve and I compared notes on the question of… read more.

I love this review of The Lean CEO from leadership blogger Michael McKinney. It’s nice that it was positive, but great that he really got the essence of the book. “It is a holistic approach to management,” he said of Lean in the review, “It produces excellence because it is good leadership.” Exactly! Review of… read more.