This week on the podcast, I am speaking with Jim Vinoski, a writer, manufacturing advocate and Lean expert with a focus in engineering, operations and management. In this episode, Jim and I talk about Lean in manufacturing and how leaders can involve and excite their team when it comes to implementing Lean. We also talk about some of the important lessons and tips Jim has for someone just starting out in Lean. What You’ll Learn This Episode: Jim’s best and worst lean experiences The culture of c...
Oct 19, 2021•29 min•Season 1Ep. 55
This week on the podcast, I am speaking with Matthew Singh. Matthew is the Director of Operational Excellence and Master Black Belt for the Department of Administrative Services in the state of Nebraska and has 20 years of experience in progressive management roles. In this episode, Matt and I talk about Operational Excellence, his work in the state of Nebraska and the importance of listening to the voice of the customer as a leader. What You’ll Learn This Episode: How Matt got his start with Op...
Oct 12, 2021•38 min•Season 1Ep. 54
On this week’s episode, I’m talking with Valorie Hendrix, the owner and consultant of Dynamic Empire Consulting. Valorie has over five years of working in different areas of project management, including cost reduction, Value Engineering, quality management, and Lean and Six Sigma. During this episode, Valorie and I talk about Value Engineering and Value Analysis, what it is and how you can integrate it into your organization. What You’ll Learn This Episode: What is VA/VE How your organization c...
Oct 05, 2021•15 min•Season 1Ep. 53
This week on the podcast, I’m excited to be talking with Craig Tedrow, an experienced Continuous Improvement professional with a demonstrated history of working in the automotive, aerospace, and defense industry. Craig is also a Senior Consultant at PA Consulting. In this episode, Craig and I talk about standard work, why it’s important to implement and how you can involve your team members with standard work to help improve your processes during the Lean journey. What You’ll Learn This Episode:...
Sep 28, 2021•25 min•Season 1Ep. 52
This week on the podcast, I’m chatting with Bruce Hamilton. Bruce is President of GBMP, a Boston-based non-profit founded in 1994 that provides Lean and Six Sigma assistance to manufacturing, healthcare and service organizations. In this episode, Bruce and I chat about how technology development is impacting Lean and how organizations can reduce turnover and increase employee retention during Covid. What You’ll Learn This Episode: The Lean Toyota Production system and why some organizations have...
Sep 21, 2021•42 min•Season 1Ep. 51
This week I’m talking with Adam Lawrence, the Managing Partner of Process Improvement Partners, LLC and the author of The Wheel of Sustainability. During this episode Adam and I talk about his book and what inspired him to write the book. We also talk about what the wheel of sustainability really means and how you can use this information to create sustainable solutions. What You’ll Learn This Episode: Why Adam wrote the Wheel of Sustainability and what he was trying to solve How to sustain the ...
Sep 14, 2021•39 min•Season 1Ep. 50
This week I’m talking with Richard Sheridan, the co-founder of Menlo Innovations where his team’s mission is to end human suffering in the workplace. Richard is also the author of J oy, Inc. - How We Built a Workplace People Love and Chief Joy Officer . In this episode, Rich and I talk about his company Menlo Innovations and the importance of having a balanced and satisfying work culture, including how you can bring about a culture change in your own organization. What You’ll Learn This Episode:...
Sep 07, 2021•41 min•Season 1Ep. 49
On the podcast this week I’m speaking with Tanya Stinson, who is the founder of Leaning Towards Change, LLC. and an experienced leader in Lean and the healthcare industry. During this episode, Tanya and I are talking about Lean and healthcare. We go over how a healthcare setting is different when it comes to Lean and how leaders can identify and reduce waste in order to better serve patients. What You’ll Learn This Episode: Waste in the healthcare world How perception plays a part in learning to...
Aug 31, 2021•39 min•Season 1Ep. 48
This week I’m speaking with Brion Hurley, a Lean Six Sigma Master Black Belt and founder of Business Performance Improvement, a sustainable process improvement consulting firm. In this episode, Brion and I talk about the major differences between Six Sigma and Lean and how continuous improvement can be applied to the social sector. What You’ll Learn This Episode: Lean vs. Six Sigma, the differences and commonalities How Lean can be applied in the social sector How Lean can be applied in the envi...
Aug 24, 2021•46 min•Season 1Ep. 47
This week I’m speaking with Dawn Holly Johnson, the CEO of 3D value group and the author of the soon to be released book What CEOs Don't Know. During this episode, Dawn and I chat about Operational Excellence and how leaders can improve their overall organizational performance by adopting simple strategies and lean concepts. What You’ll Learn This Episode: What compelled Dawn to write her book The top 3 areas that are lacking in traditional organizations when it comes to Operational Excellence W...
Aug 17, 2021•33 min•Season 1Ep. 46
This week I’m speaking with Deb Coviello. Deb is the founder of Illumination Partners, Author of the book CEO’s Compass - Your Guide to Getting Back on Track and the host of The Drop In CEO Podcast. In this episode, Deb and I talk about developing high performing leaders, how you can find them and the best ways to prepare them for their leadership roles. What You’ll Learn This Episode: The inspiration behind writing her book What is a high performer and can everyone be a high performer? Developi...
Aug 10, 2021•39 min•Season 1Ep. 45
This week I’m speaking with Crystal Davis, an experienced business process improvement consultant and certified leadership development coach and CEO of The Lean Coach, Inc. Crystal and I talk about how leaders and businesses can shift to efficiently working during the pandemic and how leaders can help their team members with the adjustment of returning to the workplace as we come out of the pandemic. What You’ll Learn This Episode: How the pandemic has shifted how Crystal works with clients Proj...
Aug 03, 2021•32 min•Season 1Ep. 44
This week I’m speaking with Siobhan McHale, the Executive General Manager of People, Culture & Change (HR) at DuluxGroup and the author of The Insider’s Guide to Culture Change: Creating a Workplace that Delivers, Grows, and Adapts. Siobhan and I talk about the importance of workplace culture and the steps you need to take to bring about a culture change in your workplace. What You’ll Learn This Episode: What is workplace culture? The typical patterns of workplace culture Creating culture ch...
Jul 27, 2021•23 min•Season 1Ep. 43
This week I’m speaking with Mike Leigh, who is the President of OpX Solutions, a performance improvement company that helps manufacturers remove the barriers that prevent them from achieving their goals by developing leaders and improving processes. In this episode we talk about Kaizen events, including why they are important and how to ensure that the outcome of the event is successful. What You’ll Learn This Episode: What are Kaizen events and what is their purpose How to define success at a K...
Jul 20, 2021•40 min•Season 1Ep. 42
This week I’m speaking with David Mann, who has over 25 years of consulting on lean and lean management implementations in a wide range of manufacturing, health care, enterprise business processes, and extended value chains. In this episode we talk about David’s book and one of my favorite lean books, Creating a Lean Culture and how you can create the behaviors and practices of a lean management system in your own organization. What You’ll Learn This Episode: What inspired David to write Creatin...
Jul 13, 2021•41 min•Season 1Ep. 41
This week I’m speaking with John Dyer, an author, speaker, teacher and consultant in team based continuous process improvement. With over 30 years experience, he is the President of John Dyer & Associates where he works with leaders in many different industries in the area of process improvement and leadership development. In this episode we talk about the different styles of leadership and how they apply to transforming the overall culture of an organization. We also chat about John’s book,...
Jul 06, 2021•37 min•Season 1Ep. 40
This week I’m chatting with Katie Anderson, an internationally recognized leadership coach, consultant, author and professional speaker. Katie is best known for her focus on helping individuals and organizations lead with intention. Katie is also the author of “Learning to Lead, Leading to Learn” and wrote the forward for my book. In this episode we talk about being an intentional leader, and creating a structure for your learning and practice. What You’ll Learn This Episode: What it means to be...
Jun 29, 2021•31 min•Season 1Ep. 39
This week I’m chatting with Paul Dunlop, a Lean expert and Principal Consultant with over 20 years of management and manufacturing experience across a broad range of industries. In this episode we talk about focusing on accountability and performance management to improve your overall productivity. We also chat about why it’s so important to build your improvement on a solid foundation so that you can move from chaos and lack of structure to calm productivity. What You’ll Learn This Episode: How...
Jun 22, 2021•40 min•Season 1Ep. 38
This week I’m chatting with Pennie Saum, a process improvement expert currently in the transportation field about her experience with Lean and how her past personal struggles have influenced her today. In this episode, we talk about Pennie’s work with process improvement, employee engagement, and A3 thinking. We also go into detail about her work as an author and speaker working with survivors of trauma and abuse. What You’ll Learn This Episode: A3 thinking The importance of personal development...
Jun 15, 2021•21 min•Season 1Ep. 37
This week, I’m talking to lean expert Tim Schipper about his book Innovative Lean Development and The Highly Effective Office and how you can incorporate lean into your office. In this episode we talk about how to use lean techniques in the office and admin side of business to eliminate excess waste so your business and team can be at their optimal performance. What You’ll Learn This Episode: Using lean in your office and the administrative side of business Eliminating motion waste and excess pr...
Jun 08, 2021•33 min•Season 1Ep. 36
This week, I’m speaking with the founder and CEO of Impruver, Inc. Calvin Williams. Calvin founded Impruver Technologies after working for 20 years as an Operations Leader and Engineer with some of America’s premier manufacturing companies, generating Billions in growth opportunities and cost savings for those he has served. In this episode we talk about daily improvement and self discipline to leverage your continuous improvement journey. What You’ll Learn This Episode: Impruver and the benefit...
Jun 01, 2021•36 min•Season 1Ep. 35
This week, I’m speaking with certified Lean Six Sigma Master Black Belt, Project Management Professional and CI Instructor Katie Labedz, about her new book “How to Improve Absolutely Anything.” In this episode we talk about Katie’s recent book and the importance of continuous improvement including how to integrate it into your everyday life even outside of the office. What You’ll Learn This Episode: Visual leadership and how to use it How you can use continuous improvement in your everyday life ...
May 25, 2021•23 min•Season 1Ep. 34
This week, I’m speaking with Karyn Ross, the author of How to Coach for Creativity and Service Excellence: A Lean Coaching Workbook, and coauthor of the Shingo Award-winning, The Toyota Way to Service Excellence: Lean Transformation in Service Organizations. Karyn is an internationally acclaimed consultant, coach and lean practitioner, and focuses on teaching organizations of all sizes and sectors how to use creativity combined with Toyota Way principles, practices and tools. This powerful combi...
May 18, 2021•28 min•Season 1Ep. 33
This week, I’m talking with Bob Emiliani, engineer, researcher, author, historian of progressive management, educational reformer, and executive coach. Bob is also a long-time TPS/Lean practitioner and was the first to focus on so-called "Lean leadership" as an area of scholarly study. Dr. Emiliani is an accomplished author whose work spans three disciplines: engineering, social sciences, and humanities. He has authored or co-authored 45 peer-reviewed papers in six different subject areas (leade...
May 11, 2021•35 min•Season 1Ep. 32
This week, I’m talking with Karen Martin, President of the global consulting firm TKMG, Inc. and President and Founder of TKMG Academy, Inc. Karen is a leading authority on business performance improvement, problem solving, and Lean management systems. Known for her keen diagnostic skills and rapid-results approach, Karen and her team have worked with clients—such as Adventist Health, AT&T, Chevron, Epson, GlaxoSmithKline, Goodwill Industries, International Monetary Fund, Lenovo, Mayo Clinic...
May 04, 2021•27 min•Season 1Ep. 31
This week, I’m talking with Deondra Wardelle, a corporate trainer, licensed health coach, problem solver, motivational speaker and continuous improvement professional. Deondra is an inspirational leader who serves as a strategic business partner, cultural change steward and operational expert. She has effectively led change management process strategies that facilitate organizational transformation and increase overall capabilities. While her inclusive management style encourages idea sharing an...
Apr 27, 2021•34 min•Season 1Ep. 30
In this episode, I talk with Ron Pereira, the co-founder of Gemba Academy and the host of the Gemba Academy Podcast. Ron also has more than 20 years experience working in operations, engineering, supply chain, and continuous improvement. We talk about Ron’s start with Lean and Six Sigma, how the Gemba Academy was born, the importance of scientific thinking and his advice to anyone on the continuous improvement journey. Important Links: https://www.linkedin.com/in/leansixsigmaacademy/ https://www...
Apr 20, 2021•44 min•Season 1Ep. 30
In this episode, I introduce you to Question 2 out of my book, Avoiding the Continuous Appearance Trap: Where Are Your Leaders Spending Their Time? I talk about leader standard work, Dr. Jeff Liker's Leadership Development Model, and the 6 key traits of a lean leader.
Apr 13, 2021•32 min•Season 1Ep. 29
In this episode, I talk with Charlie Protzman about how to leverage lean in the healthcare industry. Charlie gives us some great history around PDCA as well as a deep dive into a few case studies where he applied the BASICS Lean Implementation Model in hospitals.
Apr 06, 2021•51 min•Season 1Ep. 28
In this episode, I play back a recording of a workshop presentation I gave at the Lean Six Sigma World Conference where I discussed the famous Marshmallow Challenge. I introduced some facilitation techniques and discussion questions for exercise reflection time.
Mar 31, 2021•22 min•Season 1Ep. 27
