My days as a practitioner and student of Lean Production at AutoEuropa (VW) and MIT taught me a simple, but valuable lesson – “It’s the System, Stupid” All the different components of ‘how to do more with less’ were available (production efficiency and reliability, quality, supplier integration, employee involvement, etc.) – Toyota was the first to put them all under one
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The new management fad is here: Teaching large companies to adopt Lean Startup thinking (Yes, I’m guilty as charged myself). But this is already off to a bad start if it is simply a hammer hitting another nail. The Classic Lean The two previous instantiations of Lean Thinking were certainly the right tool for the job. First applied to manufacturing, ‘classic’
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Taking a page from Lean Production (the rigorous scientific-like management practices used by Industrial Engineers since the day of mass production, coupled with a heavy dose of Japanese-management style employee engagement), the Lean Startup movement has taken the entrepreneurship world by storm – finally providing a playbook to make a system out of winning in what has previously seamed like
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When the American auto industry desperately needed help in the 1980’s to catch up to foreign competition, namely from Japan, it essentially followed the motto: ”If you can’t beat them, join them.” Unconditionally, American auto companies gradually adopted a management philosophy that came to be known as “Lean Production” to improve competitiveness in operations, from logistics to manufacturing and sales.
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Necrophone 