The Start of Lean Leadership

How and when did Lean leadership become separate from Lean production as its own distinct area of study and focused practice?

Well, in the mid-1980s through mid-1990s, all anyone really knew was “JIT” and “Lean production,” the term introduced by John Krafcik in 1988. People’s focus was entirely on Lean in operations and on Lean tools and methods. The unique mindset and leadership capabilities necessary to lead Lean production (and later, Lean enterprise) efforts did not exist in an explicit way. Lean leadership was not well understood by even those who had pioneered its application in companies outside of Toyota.

In July of 1994, I transferred from Pratt & Whitney’s engineering department in Florida to their Connecticut manufacturing operations. I participated in my first Shingijutsu kaizen a month later, followed by several more in the year thereafter. I spent the prior three years reading lots of books and papers on Western leadership theory and practice and Eastern philosophy. I did this as a personal interest activity to improve my own leadership skills at work. As a result of what I had learned, I was able to make connections between what I had read, how I led others in practice, and what I learned in Shingijutsu genba kaizen.

I figured out how Lean tools could be applied to improve one’s leadership skills and capabilities – especially my own. I called it “continuous personal improvement.” Nobody was thinking of Lean leadership in that way then. The only thought was how to apply Lean tools in production to reduce costs, improve quality, and shorten lead-times.

In October of 1995, I attended a focus group meeting on leadership development and shared my ideas on “continuous personal improvement” with the group. Everyone, especially the leader of the focus group (an outside leadership development consultant) was impressed with what I had come up with. I formalized it into a presentation and gave copies to the executive vice president of operations and a director of operations in charge of leadership development. They loved what I had done and asked me to present it at the upcoming operations leadership meeting on 17 November 1995.

Near the end of the day’s program, I gave my presentation to the 150 or so people in the audience. Though it was well-received, I could sense that people found it to be a strange and unusual way to think about leadership and how to improve one’s leadership capabilities. Click on the image at right to view my presentation. This was the beginning of my two-decade effort to understand and develop the concept and practice of Lean leadership.

A few years later, this presentation became the basis for my first paper on Lean leadership titled: “Continuous Personal Improvement,” published in 1998.

Remember, at the time, we had precious little documentation from Toyota to help us understand how they viewed leadership and leadership development for their production system. But, there were some books translated into English that once could deduce clues from (such as “Respect for People” — a constant theme), and I found that my ideas on Lead leadership paralleled theirs. But, it was the Shingijutsu training on genba kaizen, and the conversations at dinner with sensei, that filled in many blanks about the thinking behind TPS and the ways in which Toyota managers led people.

Shingijutsu genba kaizen was instrumental in helping me understand Toyota-style leadership and propelled me to become an early advocate for the “Respect for People” principle. My second paper, “Lean Behaviors” (1998), was squarely focused on “Respect for People” as the enabler for Lean production success. Click here to view a complete list my publications on Lean leadership.

Around 2008, people started to take an interest in Lean leadership. That interest gained traction in 2010, and has grown stronger in the last few years. As a long-time advocate for Lean leadership and the “Respect for People” principle, I cannot help but lament the long time it has taken people to realize how fundamental these are to Lean success. We cannot change the past, but we should constantly reflect on those people — good and capable employees — who have experienced harm (e.g. layoffs) by leaders’ improper understanding and practice of Lean management, and strive to do far better in the future.

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from Bob Emiliani http://www.bobemiliani.com/the-start-of-lean-leadership/