Rather than post separately about this book, I thought I’d keep the conversation going here instead. So, here are my take-aways in somewhat raw form:

• Lean principles involve teamwork, communication, efficient use of resources and elimination of waste, and continuous improvement (kaizen).
• While mass production is about “good enough,” lean production is about the pursuit of excellence (i.e. the “endless quest for perfection”).
• Mass production ushered in the interchangeable part and with it the interchangeable (direct) worker. From this emerged the “indirect worker” (i.e. original knowledge worker).
• Toyoda’s (sic) study of muda at Ford was fascinating. (Muda is Japanese for waste that encompasses wasted effort, materials and time.)
• Lean production showcases an extremely skilled and highly motivated workforce–one that doesn’t hold back knowledge or effort. A dynamic work team is the heart of a lean factory. Purposeful, not dispirited…
• The statement of a shusa‘s ability to embue personality (upon an automobile) was a powerful notion of leadership and its combination of power and authority.
• continuing challenge != tension
• Take an idea to its logical extreme in the form of a “what if?” exercise. What does the result look like? What side effects are likely?

Perhaps my strongest take away is the following equation I derived from the lean approach: experiment >> discouragement >> commitment >> improvement.

I’m staring at the Poppendiecks’ two books on lean software development, thinking that they should perhaps bubble up in my reading queue. Stay tuned…

Matt

cit: Womack, James; Jones, Daniel; Roos, Daniel. The Machine That Changed The World – The story of lean production. New York: HarperCollins, 1990.