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5 Tips for Creating a High-Performance Organization Culture

Companies across industries are facing unprecedented talent shortages. This causes these organizations to place underqualified people in highly specialized roles to fill gaps and continue [...]

High-Performance Organization Stats

In today's rapidly changing business landscape, it's more important than ever to have a high-performance organization (HPO). An HPO is one that consistently achieves superior [...]

Five High-Performance Organization Principles to Incorporate Today

In today's fast-paced and highly competitive business world, companies are constantly striving to achieve high-performance levels. However, this is no easy task, and it requires [...]

PDF: High-Performance Organization

A High-Performance Organization (HPO) is a company that consistently achieves outstanding results and stands out from its competitors in terms of innovation, customer satisfaction, employee [...]

7 Excellent Examples of High-Performance Organizations

High performance organizations (HPOs) are those that consistently achieve outstanding results and stand out in their respective fields. They are characterized by their ability to [...]

The Ultimate High-Performance Organization Framework

What is a High-Performance Organization and how do you build one? How do you measure your progress along the way? How do you know when [...]

The Simplest Method for Setting Powerful Goals

The Simplest Method for Setting Powerful Goals whitepaper presents an easier and more scalable approach to setting goals. According to Forbes 92% of people never [...]

The Ultimate Strategy Execution Framework Whitepaper

The Ultimate Strategy Execution Framework whitepaper presents a brilliantly simple process for achieving strategic goals. In a time when businesses face seemingly insurmountable challenges in [...]

Why Your Strategy Execution Process is Driving Your Best People Away

This article is a section from the upcoming book by Calvin L Williams titled F.I.T. – Agile Strategy Execution for Unstoppable Growth. I know a woman who [...]

Pain Killer or Vitamin? The Real Role of Lean in Transformation

Lean has a little branding problem; but of course, it’s much bigger than that. I recall sitting in my undergraduate Industrial Engineering classes at the [...]

Why Bottom-up Lean Transformation is a Lost Cause

This article is a section from the upcoming book by Calvin L Williams titled F.I.T. - Agile Strategy Execution for Unstoppable Growth The mighty Mississippi [...]

Why Companies are Ditching Lean Programs for Strategy Execution

This article is a section from the upcoming book by Calvin L Williams titled F.I.T. - Agile Strategy Execution for Unstoppable Growth After the titanic [...]

If You Like Football, You’ll Love Agile Strategy Execution

You’re the quarterback in the Superbowl game. You have exactly 2 minutes on the clock and you’re now down by 5 points. The other team [...]

What Is Agile Strategy Execution?

Strategy development, deployment, and execution is a practice that the business elite once kept secret from general population as a means to increase competitive advantage. [...]

6 Best Strategy Execution Software

In this blog post, you will find the 6 best Strategy Execution Software solutions on the market, ranked in order, with all the information necessary [...]

How Kaizen Events Distort the Meaning of Kaizen

The mighty Mississippi River. A powerful and continuous flow of water that stretches from North to South in the Unites States of America. The river [...]

Lean is Dead on Arrival. Do this instead.

Lean was doomed from the day it was named. Despite its good intentions to create the ultimate production system, Lean and its misapplication has led [...]

Toyota KATA Questions and Their Secret Meanings

5 in 5. Who would have imagined that the secret to a thriving Continuous Improvement culture could be boiled down to 5 questions in 5 [...]

Toyota KATA Summary – Managing People for Improvement, Adaptiveness, and Superior Results

So you've heard of Toyota KATA and want to know what its all about. Toyota KATA has introduced several paradigm shifts in the way we [...]

What is Toyota KATA? …and Why You Should Be Doing It

There's a damn good chance that Toyota KATA is the missing ingredients in your Lean or Continuous Improvement recipe. KATA comes from the martial arts [...]

The Sinister Side of Kaizen Events…and the Better Alternative

I get it. We all love the exhilarating feeling of finishing a week-long kaizen event where chaos finally comes to order and the results are [...]

Will Lean Grow Up to Become Self-Improvement?

Some years ago, my wife and I start getting into this show called Supernanny. The premise of the show is that an expert nanny would [...]

Why the Old Way of Doing Lean Sucks!

I know the title is a little click-batey - but as you read my story, it will make perfect sense. About 10 years into my [...]

4 Hidden Benefits of Continuous Improvement

We've all heard the pitch for Continuous Improvement that says it can help cut costs, improve quality, reduce inventory, increase customer satisfaction, improve safety, increase [...]

3 Problem-solving Methods You Never Knew Existed

The world sure has its fair share of problems; there's certainly no argument there. However, there is also no shortage of problem-solving methods. We're all [...]

The Pivotal Role of the Modern Continuous Improvement Manager

We can all thank the manufacturing industry for its incredible contributions to the world of Continuous Improvement. This discipline has become a pillar of performance [...]

Continuous Improvement Software Comparison

Continuous Improvement Software can be a great tool for helping your business to create more value for customers and simultaneously reduce operating costs. Some software [...]

22 Powerful Daily Improvement Quotes to Inspire Lean Habits

In the beginning, there were tools. When the original researchers went into Toyota to find out the secrets of how they built the world's greatest [...]

6 Best Continuous Improvement Software [2022 Update]

In this blog post, you will find the 6 best Continuous Improvement Software solutions on the market, ranked in order, with all the information necessary [...]

Winning in the Now Normal

60 years ago, some people were reluctant to embrace software as a way of working because it was seen as buggy, hard to use, and [...]

What Our Lean Forefathers Got Totally Wrong About Technology

There's, without question, a bias against the idea that software could be a tool used to help companies accelerate their Lean journey. Lean and Continuous [...]

There’s a Tool for That! 100+ Lean Tools in One Click

Lean, Six Sigma, and other Continuous Improvement tools can be great assets for any operation given they they are used the right way. The first [...]

What is Lean Talent Development and Why it Matters?

One of my favorite MEME's that has been floating around the internet says something to the following effect: CFO asks "what if we invest all [...]

The Fat Factory: The Parallels Between the Business and the Body

DISCLAIMER: This article is not intended to fat shame you. It's intended to fat shame your factory. So it's time for your dreaded annual check-up. [...]

The Customer Value Bill of Rights and the Lean Manufacturing Justice System

You've probably heard the expression that you succeed by helping others to be successful. Well that's also true for a manufacturing business. Truly putting the [...]

Beyond Autonomous Maintenance: The New World Class

Okay so you've achieved and are sustaining base condition across your entire plant, now what? Does Continuous Improvement end there? Machines are running in peak [...]

3 Big Problems with Big Data in Continuous Improvement

Just like with anything, there's two sides of the coin when it comes to Big Data. We've all heard how Big Data is going to [...]

What’s the Right Approach Between TPM and Lean Manufacturing?

When it comes to TPM and Lean Manufacturing, there is a divide among Continuous Improvement professionals as to which is subordinate to the other. What [...]

5 Excellent Ways to Generate Demand for Continuous Improvement

Why is it that we're always searching for the next Lean Tool that's going to transform the organization? With each passing fad or Continuous Improvement [...]

Base Condition: Getting Your Factory to Run Better than Brand New

News Flash: If you're experiencing frequent breakdowns during production runs, you're probably not in base condition. If your operators are calling maintenance several times per [...]

Change Management: Driving Growth While Sustaining the Base

If you search for Change Management across the interwebs, you'll get all kinds of results, much of it focused on understanding and coaching a person [...]

30 Insightful Quotes about Continuous Improvement Coaching

The practice of Continuous Improvement coaching has increased in popularity over the last decade, partly because of its clear connection with achieving superior business results. [...]

5 Steps to Overcoming Resistance to Change in Continuous Improvement

Let's see, the data is accurate and complete, there's an obvious business case, and this change will make everyone's job so much easier. There will [...]

This Lean Tool Will Have You Celebrating a Lot More Small Wins

Well if a journey of a thousand miles begins with one step...and a Lean transformation is a journey; then when do we get to celebrate? [...]

Can Command-and-Control and Continuous Improvement Coexist?

Command-and-Control organizations are built around principles of efficiency, speed, and execution. On the surface, these sound like good qualities of a Lean organization as well. [...]

The 5 Essential Levers of an Unstoppable Lean Culture

There are over 1,000 Lean tools and counting that can be used to improve processes and help a business become more Lean. All them have [...]

9 Common Lean Culture Illnesses and How to Cure Them

Creating a Lean Culture might require some medicine, a bit of therapy, and some deep meditation. You may feel like Continuous Improvement doesn’t work for [...]

Five Powerful Root Cause Analysis Methods You’ve Never Heard Of

There are a ton of Root Cause Analysis Methods out there, and new ones are popping up all the time. This post dives into some [...]

How to Attract, Develop, and Retain Millennials in Manufacturing

Its no secret that Millennials are not flocking to the glorious and illustrious manufacturing jobs that have kept food on the tables of families worldwide [...]

Top 10 Most Misunderstood Lean Tools (Part 3)

Lean tools can be leveraged to accelerate your company's culture and business results in a dramatic way. However, if ineffectively applied, they can decrease hope [...]

Top 10 Most Misunderstood Lean Tools (Part 2)

Just like any technology, lean tools can create great efficiencies but need to be applied the right way in order to produce positive results. Unfortunately, [...]

Top 10 Most Misunderstood Lean Tools (Part 1)

Lean tools can be incredible assets to a business. They're usually fairly simple to understand and can produce some outstanding results. Unfortunately, many Lean tools [...]

Lean Leadership and the Technology Race: Winner Takes All

Let's talk politics. What I'm about to say may make you excited or feel a bit uncomfortable - but just stick with me, I'm going [...]

The Incredibly Transformational Power of PDCA

If you're like me, you've been seeing, saying, and maybe practicing the method behind the acronym PDCA throughout your entire Continuous Improvement career. Ever done [...]

Walking the Talk: The Continuous Improvement Leadership Downfall

I'm gonna say something I'm not supposed to say about Continuous Improvement Leadership. Don't be mad at me; and if you can't help it, just [...]

Strategy Deployment for Busy People Like You

Breaking News: A stockpile of corporate strategies have been discovered floating near the Bermuda Triangle. They appear to be unused and have clearly never been [...]

The Ultimate Lean Metric: Are You Really Improving?

So, I have good news - and I got bad news. Which one do you want to hear first? Ok the bad news...you might want [...]

Free Continuous Improvement Software is Disrupting Lean Manufacturing

Your industry is being disrupted right before your eyes. But just like the blinding flash of light from a supernova in a far away galaxy, [...]

The Brilliance Behind the 5 Why’s: The Leanest of all Lean Tools

I have some terrible news. I hate to have the one to inform you of this. But...if you or your people are no good at [...]

Why Pilots are a Terrible Approach to Lean

Want a sure-fire recipe for failure in Lean or Continuous Improvement, start by piloting a tool or process. Yea, that's right - I said it. [...]

Kazien Events Don’t Work without this Powerful Activator

Okay so you spent the last 2 months planning this Kaizen event and the big day has come. You had to give up a kidney [...]

The Only LEAN Manufacturing Tool You’ll Ever Need

Put 10 Lean experts in a room and ask them all what's the right way to do an implementation and you're likely to get 10 [...]

Toyota KATA – How to Do It and Why You Should

There's a damn good chance that Toyota KATA is the missing ingredients in your Lean or Continuous Improvement recipe. KATA comes from the martial arts [...]

Getting Results with the Fishbone Diagram

The Fishbone Diagram is easily one of the most applicable tools in your Lean toolbox. It really helps to grasp all of the potential root [...]

What is Market-driven Continuous Improvement?

Continuous improvement can be tricky. There are examples abound of companies applying all the tools and methodologies to perfection and still failing in the market. [...]

Introducing the Why-Tree: The most powerful Root Cause Analysis Tool of All

Getting to the root cause and solving the problems in your business is critical to success. The world is changing fast and your company has [...]