Exploring the Origins and Evolution of Lean Manufacturing at Toyota: A Conversation with Norman Bodek

Audio remastered June 2021

Show notes: https://www.leanblog.org/7 

Here is LeanBlog Podcast #7, a new discussion with our friend Norman Bodek, President of PCS Press and the author of many books, including Kaikaku: The Power and Magic of Lean. In this Podcast, we discuss Toyota's response to recent quality problems and recalls along with other Lean leadership topics.

LeanBlog Podcast #7 Show Notes and Approximate Timeline

• 1:40 What are Norman's thoughts on Toyota's recalls and their response of adding time back into the product development process to build in quality?
• 2:08 “When your model is being attacked, it's unnerving. Very often, people are looking for an excuse to not do something.”
• 2:50 Yes, Norman buys Toyota
• 2:57 The book 40 Years, 20 Million Ideas: The Toyota Suggestion System
• 3:50 How Toyota invests in people, their training and development and how “lifetime employment was a brilliant concept” because that investment in people is an investment in the company.
• 5:45 A few years ago, Norman visited Toyota Georgetown, why was the number of suggestions dropping? Employees had been getting $20 per suggestion, no matter how small and so employees “played the game and played it well.” So, Toyota stopped the program.
• 7:55 “The greatest respect you can show somebody is asking their opinion and listening to their ideas.”
• 8:10 Norman suggests that Toyota should have just changed their system to pay $20 for an idea “if it was worth $20.”

• 8:40 “Lifetime employment” or “lifetime improvement?”
• 9:10 As employees, do we learn and improve for the sake of “me” and “my career” or for “the company?” Norman says it's “sad” that I don't want to improve for the company's sake.
• 10:00 Although Toyota Georgetown does not have “lifetime improvement,” they have never laid off a worker.
• 10:10 Are Toyota “temp” workers treated differently? Do they get a similar sense of commitment for ideas and suggestions?
• 11:15 How “Quick and Easy Kaizen” focuses on what's good for the worker? How do you make your work more interesting and easier? Norman says, “The result will be better quality, safety, customer service, productivity…”
• 12:30 Back to Toyota's product development and quality
• 13:10 Motorola and product development engineers improving the process
• 14:00 “How can you ask employees to be innovative rather than needing to have everything controlled by management, as we do in America?”
• 14:55 Norman says, “Management is not trained extensively, as they should be”
• 16:10 Working every day to improve, as employee, in a highly competitive world
• 16:30 Sending work to China for cheaper labor to do non-value added work versus eliminating waste? Why?
• 17:40 What about Toyota describing product development problems as “bonehead mistakes?” Is that not showing “respect for people?”
• 18:00Toyota tries to take waste development out of the development process without working them too hard.
• 20:20 Why Norman likes the theme of “respect for people”