Lean For Dummies^®, 2nd Edition

by Natalie Sayer and Bruce Williams

Lean For Dummies^®, 2nd Edition

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Copyright © 2012 by John Wiley & Sons, Inc., Hoboken, New Jersey

Published by John Wiley & Sons, Inc., Hoboken, New Jersey

Published simultaneously in Canada

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ISBN 978-1-118-11756-9 (pbk); ISBN 978-1-118-22446-5 (ebk); ISBN 978-1-118-23772-4 (ebk); ISBN 978-1-118-26258-0 (ebk)

Manufactured in the United States of America

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About the Authors

Natalie J. Sayer is the owner of I-Emerge, an Arizona-based global consultancy, and co-author of Lean For Dummies, 1st Edition. She has traveled the world extensively, working with leaders in English and Spanish to improve their daily lives, businesses, and results. Natalie began studying and applying Lean in the automotive industry in the United States and Mexico before it was formally known as Lean. She has trained, coached, mentored, and rolled up her sleeves to implement Lean in organizations ranging from Fortune 130 companies to micro-businesses.

She brings a unique blend of people, process, and cultural skills to every project. Natalie has a Bachelor of Mechanical Engineering, a Masters of Manufacturing Systems Engineering, is a graduate from Coachu, a professional speaker, a Six Sigma Black Belt, a Global Leadership Executive Coach, and an actress. She is a passionate people person who lives her life with the convictions that “there is always a better way,” “change won’t happen without the people,” “adjust yourself accordingly,” and “learn from every life experience and move on.”

“To strive, to seek, to find and not to yield” —Alfred, Lord Tennyson

Bruce Williams strives for perfection and added value as a scientist, educator, consultant, entrepreneur, and executive. Leveraging the Lean principle of standardized work, this is now his seventh For Dummies work, dating from 2005, on topics including Six Sigma, Lean, Business Process Management, and Process Intelligence.

His undergraduate degrees in physics and astrophysics from the University of Colorado testify to his early passion to uncover the ultimate nature of root cause. He then was a sculler in the value stream of aerospace systems, where he shot the rapids in the tumultuous whitewater of the Hubble Telescope program. With graduate degrees in technical management and computer engineering from Johns Hopkins and the University of Colorado, Bruce then elevated his value stream role to tugboat captain, leading and managing technical teams and projects.

Decades of kaizen inspired his continuous journey through high technology, software, process improvement, and strategic management. A kaikaku moment once unleashed his entrepreneurial self in 1999; he is now charting the deeper value-stream waters as an executive with Software AG.

He lives with his standard family in the rural desert foothills of northern Scottsdale, Arizona, flowing just-in-time value in response to their continuous demand pull. He regularly suffers the muri of 5S’ing around the house and occasionally pursues the unattainable ideal state of par golf.

Dedication

To all Lean leaders who “get it,” who know that Lean happens through the people, is sustained by the culture and is a long-term journey of excellence in enterprise. To my inner circle: you enrich my life by supporting, guiding, cheering, and challenging me at every turn. To my family who is always there no matter what. Thank you all.

— Natalie J. Sayer

To my children: my daughter, Hannah, who has always been keenly able to help net-out just what is and what isn’t “value-add,” and my son, Evan — the greatest personification of 5S I’ll ever know. You both just seem to practice kaizen naturally, and inspire me to do the same. I dedicate this work to you.

— Bruce Williams

Authors’ Acknowledgments

The authors acknowledge many people who have directly and indirectly contributed to this second edition of Lean For Dummies. We are especially thankful to Christine Dicken for her voice of the customer feedback, relentless pursuit of excellence and those trés cool ARIS value-stream maps.

As members of the Lean community, we have the highest regard for the outstanding service and contributions to industry excellence delivered by the team at the Shingo Prize, and recognize Bob Miller for his vision and leadership. And thank you, Bob, for your august and inspirational foreword.

For their contributions of connections, experiences or case studies, Linda LaGanga of Mental Health Center of Denver, Erica Gibbons, Elissa Torres, Frank Cooney, Todd McCann, Jon Miller, Tim Briones, Scott Kurish, Eleanor Clements, Pamela Oakes, and from Healthcare Performance Partners, Inc., Charles Hagood, and Jason Baldwin.

Thanks to Tim Mullett for contributing his years of wisdom as our technical editor. His practical experience has been an invaluable resource to this project. We appreciate his time, efforts and suggestions.

Thank you to Patricia Hatem and Mary Miller for obtaining permission to use the excellent wall chart from Diversey Inc., part of Sealed Air.

All people interested in Lean owe their ongoing gratitude to Mark Graban and his contributors, who through the Lean Blog (www.leanblog.org) translate Lean to the world around us.

As authors and researchers, we humbly bow to the continuing miracle that is Google, and also to the ubiquitous multi-sensory stimulative and collaborative experience that is Starbucks, whom we recognize both as consumers and for their Lean initiative.

As consumers, and on behalf of consumers everywhere, we acknowledge the contributions of the brilliant pioneers who have contributed to the evolution and dissemination of what we now know as Lean: W. Edwards Deming, Taiichi Ohno, Shigeo Shingo, Norm Bodek, James Womack, and Jeffrey Liker.

But most of all, we acknowledge the many thousands of leaders and Lean practitioners globally, who regularly confront established structures, functional silos, challenging business environments, arcane accounting practices, and entrenched procedures to cut waste and find the real customer value. You make Lean thrive. You are our heroes.

Publisher’s Acknowledgments

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