The Lean Solutions Podcast

Today on the podcast, I’m talking with Karyn Ross, an internationally acclaimed consultant, coach, lean practitioner and author. Karyn is also the founder of the Love and Kindness Project which is a movement spreading kindness from person to person around the world. In this episode, Karyn talks about the movement and why it’s so important to focus on kindness, even in a Lean setting and how you can implement kind leadership everyday. What You’ll Learn This Episode: Why kindness in Lean matters Kind leadership How the Love and Kindness Project started #storiesofkindness - what it is and how it got started Why small acts of kindness are important Who the Love and Kindness Project is for and who can participate How you can practice being kind even if it doesn't come naturally to you About the Guest: Karen 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 combination enables organizations to create better, more effective and efficient ways to work. While many other Lean consultants focus on implementing tools, Karyn teaches teams how to use Practical Creativity™ to continuously strive towards service excellence. Karyn is on a mission to 'Help People Improve the World'. Important Links: https://loveandkindnessproject.org/ https://www.linkedin.com/company/the-love-and-kindness-project-foundation/ https://www.amazon.com/Kind-Leader-Practical-Eliminating-Creating/dp/0367693437

Today on the podcast, I’m talking with Alessandro Lasi, whose career includes more than 10 years in continuous improvement leadership positions. Alessandro also earned a master's in industrial engineering and has a Lean Six Sigma Black Belt certification and is also a Kaizen facilitator. In this episode, Alessandro and I talk about the mindset and culture of Lean and Continuous Improvement including different tactics and techniques to support the continuous improvement culture. What You’ll Learn This Episode: Alessandro’s background in Lean The importance of failure and learning from failure Psychological safety within Lean culture Why you need to focus on process and purpose in Lean to get results What’s needed to get continuous improvement to the next level Getting to the sweet spot in Lean Why it’s difficult for organizations to nurture CI culture Why psychological safety is so important About the Guest: Alessandro’s career includes more than ten years in continuous improvement leadership positions in FMCG, Mechanical and Machinery, Services and Retail industries at top-tier global corporations –including, but not limited to, Hertz Corporation, SCA/Essity, and Leonardo. Known for his daring vision and tireless energy, Alessandro has been helping improve processes and drive company growth for the past five years at his current employer, a multinational company active in the Mechanical and Machinery business. He joined the company in 2016, with a mission to create and apply a new pan-European Continuous Improvement approach. After such a successful endeavor, Alessandro advanced through positions of increased authority and decision-making to his current position as a Global Director Continuous Improvement. His unique ability to establish rapport with a variety of professionals, engage people across functions and offer innovative solutions for short-term and long-term process setbacks, has allowed the Company, to not only reduce its costs, but to significantly improve processes in the Manufacturing and Supply chain, and Global Aftermarket and Service divisions in a very short time. Alessandro developed and implemented a unique Global Business System (XPS) for Service and Aftermarket currently used in 30+ countries, and he successfully managed 40+ strategic business transformation improvement projects with multimillion budgets on four continents in only three years, including various restructuring and growth initiatives. For his excellent results, he was declared the 2020 Global Continuous Improvement Gold Award Winner, and Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion Champion for Europe at his current employer in 2021. He is currently leading Continuous Improvement for Global Aftermarket and Service Business Unit at his current employer, driving the strategic transformation to double global revenue in 2025. Alessandro earned a Master’s in Industrial Engineering from the University of Pisa, and he holds a Lean Sigma Black Belt Certification since 2015, and a Kaizen Facilitator Certification since 2017. He is married and lives with his wife and two children in Switzerland Important Links: https://www.linkedin.com/in/alessandrolasi/?originalSubdomain=ch

Today on the podcast, I’m talking with Nigel Thurlow,  a leading expert on Lean and Agile approaches. Nigel advises companies on successful transformation strategies and how to achieve effective and lasting change. As the chief agile at Toyota connected, he established the Toyota agile Academy and is also the co-author of The Flow System. In this episode, Nigel and I talk about Agile, how it relates to Lean and the flow from scientific thinking to Agile into the flow system. What You’ll Learn This Episode: Nigel’s background in Lean and Agile The challenges with bringing Agile into Toyota The differences between Japan and the western world with executive leadership The scientific method and why it’s so important The challenges when only dealing with deductive reasoning PDCA and Scrum Agile, what it is and how it differs and relates to Lean How Agile and Lean flow into the flow system About the Guest: Nigel Thurlow is the former Chief of Agile at Toyota, creator of the World Agility Forum award-winning ‘Scrum the Toyota Way’ approach, and the co-creator of The Flow System™. He is also a Forbes top 10 noted author for his work as co-author of the book on The Flow System and is a well-known Keynote Speaker. He also co-authors The Flow Guide. Nigel is an internationally recognized expert in the Toyota Production System and The Toyota Way as well as Lean Thinking, Agile, Scrum, and Complexity concepts. In addition to his work at Toyota in recent years he has also taught and coached at Vodafone, Banco Popular, GE, Bose, 3M, Microsoft, University of North Texas, and to the faculty at MIT. Nigel also presents regularly for The Lean Institute at their events and is considered a leading expert in bridging the Lean and Agile worlds following his pioneering work at Toyota. As a Professional Scrum Trainer, the first one ever in Toyota, and the first to have been certified by both the creators of Scrum, he has trained over 8000 people worldwide as of 2021. Nigel is extensively published online and has co-authored several peer reviewed white papers and journal publications on team science. He acts as an advisor on several boards at the University of North Texas as well as contributing to Chief Executive Magazine. Nigel currently serves as the CEO of The Flow Consortium, and as an interim executive with several high-profile brands advising executive leadership teams on lean and agile strategies in complex business and organizational design environments. Important Links: https://flowguides.org/ https://www.getflowtrained.com/ https://www.amazon.com/Flow-System-Evolution-Thinking-Complexity/dp/1680400584 https://www.linkedin.com/in/nigelthurlow/ The Flow System read online for free via UNT - https://library.unt.edu/aquiline-books/flow-058-8/ The Slack community - https://join.slack.com/t/the-flow-system/shared_invite/zt-o6zfwlwx-HkoqExXlmEWSwDaAFXAejA

Today on the podcast, I’m talking with Gareth Shaw. Gareth is the President, UK & Europe of Doceree, the first global network of physician-only platforms for programmatic messaging. In this episode, Gareth and I talk about leading high performing work teams and how you can maintain your high performing teams digitally during the pandemic. Gareth also shares information about pharma marketing and technology in the pharma industry. What You’ll Learn This Episode: The definition of a high performing work team Challenges for teams who want to be high performing The Five Dysfunctions of a Team and how you can avoid them The characteristics of leaders in charge of high performing teams The background of Doceree How the pandemic has changed the pharma marketing space Maintaining and building a high performing team digitally Programmatic marketing How programmatic solutions are improving the healthcare of the pharma industry About the Guest: Gareth Shaw is the President, UK & Europe of Doceree, the first global network of physician-only platforms for programmatic messaging. Prior to joining Doceree, Gareth was the General Manager, Global Programmatic, of PulsePoint where he led the programmatic and operations divisions. Further, he was the Senior Direct Response Sales Specialist at Yahoo! Throughout his career, Gareth has gained vast experience in the sales categories across the digital media and advertising technology sectors. He has a well-regarded background for building high-performance teams and implementing strategic plans to facilitate the growth of his organizations. Important Links: https://doceree.com/ https://www.linkedin.com/in/gareth-shaw-9214403/?originalSubdomain=uk

Today on the podcast, I’m talking with Anna Tagliapietra, an Italian Lean Office trainer and consultant. Anna mixes methods and tools from design thinking and design sprint to the traditional Lean tools using micro structures to help people interact and find ideas during their improvement projects In this episode, Anna talks about design thinking in Lean and how organizations can use micro structures. What You’ll Learn This Episode: Anna’s background in Lean What is a micro structure How you can use a micro structure at a Kaizen event The benefit of silent voting during an event How microstructure or liberating structures can help in Lean projects or Six Sigma projects Where you can use micro structures and liberating structures Ecocycle planning Purpose to practice and how to use it Lightning decision jam Time boxing and why it’s important About the Guest: Anna Tagliapietra is an Italian Lean Office trainer and consultant. She comes from the marketing and communication sector and was a partner in an advertising company before committing 100% in her Lean career. Anna worked for Ferrari, Scavolini and Clementoni and is now training a group of Lean Practitioners for Gucci RTW. In order to make good use of her former education, Anna mixes methods and tools from Design Thinking and Design Sprint to the traditional Lean tools, using microstructures to help people interact and find ideas during their improvement projects. Important Links: https://www.liberatingstructures.com/ https://www.instagram.com/leanoffice/?hl=en https://www.linkedin.com/in/annatagliapietra/ https://www.youtube.com/c/AJSmart https://www.youtube.com/c/AnnaTagliapietra

Today on the podcast, I’m talking with Dirk Fischer, an automotive General Manager, Lean Operations Engineering supply chain and Quality Manager expert with more than 25 years of experience. In this episode, Dirk and I go over system waste, what’s causing it and how you can avoid it. We also go over holistic business excellence and how it relates to system waste. What You’ll Learn This Episode: Dirk’s background in Lean and how he got started The definition of System Waste How to identify and eliminate System Waste Holistic Business Excellence How Holistic Business Excellence can help with System Waste How you can help drive the Holistic Business approach Aspects of Lean that are potentially untapped About the Guest: I was born June, 20th 1970 in the Stuttgart area, Southern Germany and finished my mechanical engineering study in September 1992. I am an automotive General Manager, lean operations, engineering, supply chain and quality management expert with more than 25 years of experience, consistently proving the ability to holistically turn around underperforming plants and groups of plants. The various turnarounds were mainly achieved through inspiring leadership for change and creating a LEAN KPI driven continuous improvement culture. I continuously implement effective action plans, which are designed to rapidly improve Customer satisfaction, Quality, Cost, Delivery, Safety, Morale AND Working Capital and therefore delivering sustainable bottom line results. The pattern of success was usually to start with intensive observations on the shop floor (Go to Gemba) to really understand the problems, detailed discussions and reflections with the team, coaching the plant management team in order to establish and implement the most important actions, define high impact KPIs, provide tools to monitor progress and review frequently for effectiveness of implemented actions. This approach enabled me to frequently develop high performance teams. My leadership style and my acting and thinking is highly influenced by Deming/Ackoff/Toyota Way/ Theory of Constraints/Stephen Covey and others. In the past 10 years I held various COO/CRO roles with a responsibility ranging from a single plant with 50 million € of sales up to international multi site responsibility with 20 plants and 3,6 billion € of sales. Having worked for more than 10 years for international Anglo-American companies with strong financial focus, I am used to work in environments with strong financial controls and reporting and intensive budgeting processes. Important Links: https://www.linkedin.com/in/dirk-fischer-06850011?trk=author_mini-profile_title&originalSubdomain=de https://www.gaoexperts.com/

Patrick Adams is the author of the best selling book “Avoiding the Continuous Appearance Trap.” He is an international speaker, coach, and consultant. Patrick has been delivering bottom-line results through specialized process improvement solutions for over 20 years. He's worked with all types of businesses from private, non-profits, government, and manufacturing ranging from small business to billion dollar corporations. Patrick is a proven leader and highly experienced consultant with specific niche focus on organizational strategy and leadership development which brings a unique human approach to sound team-building practices; creating consensus and enabling empowerment. He motivates, inspires, and drives the right results at all points in business processes. Important Links: https://www.linkedin.com/in/patrickadamsii/ https://www.findleansolutions.com/book/

This week on the podcast, I’m speaking with Randy Otterbridge. Randy is the Chief Idea Officer at RBridge Business Institute, which is a Consulting and Business Creation company and is also an author and a podcast host. In this episode, Randy and I talk about how you can apply Continuous Improvement and Lean principles into not only your business but also your personal life in order to create a better lifestyle. What You’ll Learn This Episode: Randy’s experience with manufacturing and continuous improvement RBridge  Business Institute and how it got started Having a generalist approach Why companies need to be innovative in order to not be left behind The application of CI principles into your personal life How Lean and CI principles can result in a better life overall Applying Five S to your personal life What is a mastermind and why it’s important How you can benefit from a mastermind Giving your team a safe space to express their ideas How you can use your team members ideas to benefit the company About the Guest: Randy Otterbridge (AKA, The Monetize Your Life Guy) developed the "Monetize Method" to help you bring more income into your life and profits to your business. "Your life (and the life of your businesses) are filled with gold--I simply guide you to it and hand you the shovel to dig out more of it." Additionally, Randy is the Chief Idea Officer of RBRIDGE BUSINESS INSTITUTE, LLC which serves as the holder of portfolio businesses where business models are created, tested, and leveraged to maximize profits. He then uses these tests to teach individuals and companies how to increase income and maximize profits. How he does it… is the secret sauce, some of which he might share with us today. Important Links: https://www.linkedin.com/in/randyotterbridge/ https://www.facebook.com/RBRIDGEINSTITUTE/ randy@rbridgebusinessinstitute.com

This week on the podcast, I’m speaking with Jim Huntzinger. Jim is the founder of Lean Frontiers and has also launched new business in the free market healthcare arena through several virtual lean and free market healthcare events and the United in Care Summit. He is also the author of several books. In this episode, Jim and I talk about the relevance of Lean accounting and how TWI fits into the Lean business model. What You’ll Learn This Episode: The start of Lean Frontiers Jim’s background in Lean Lean accounting- what it is and why it’s different from traditional accounting What industry’s Lean accounting applies to The future of Lean accounting and whether it’s still relevant Aspects of Lean that are potentially untapped The first step you should take in Lean process and product development Cross functional teams and process development TWI- what it is  and how it fits into the Lean business model The TWI Summit Lean Healthcare About the Guest: Jim Huntzinger began his career as a manufacturing engineer with Toyota and then was transplanted to North America to support Toyota.  In 2005 Huntzinger founded Lean Frontiers. He developed and operates the immersive Skillpoint Workshops for Job Instruction and Toyota Kata. He has also launched new business in the free market healthcare arena through several virtual lean and free market healthcare events and the United in Care Summit.  He has also authored many books to include, Lean Cost Management: Accounting for Lean by Establishing Flow, Roots of Lean – Training Within Industry: The Origin of Kaizen, just to name a few. Important Links: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jim-huntzinger-7001581/ https://leanfrontiers.com/ https://podcasts.apple.com/cr/podcast/connecting-the-dots/id1534151238

This week on the podcast, I’m speaking with Brian Bolen. Brian has 12 years of quality and CI experience. He's an ASQ, certified Six Sigma Black Belt. He also has his master's degree in operational excellence from Eastern Michigan University In this episode, Brian and I talk about why leaders need to be focusing on servant leadership and how it can help leaders be more effective in their roles. What You’ll Learn This Episode: Servant leadership, what it is and why it matters Brian’s experience with continuous improvement and how he got started How servant leadership helps leaders to lead more effectively Brian’s biggest improvements and failures in his Lean career Brian’s advice to someone just starting out in Lean Books and podcasts that have helped Brian through his Lean journey Why you should always be learning About the Guest: Brian Bolen is an Experienced Process Engineer with a demonstrated history of working in the consumer goods industry. Skilled in Continuous Improvement, Lean Six Sigma, Statistical Data Analysis, and GMPs.  Brian is a strong engineering professional with a Master of Science (MS) focused in Quality Management and Operational Excellence from Eastern Michigan University. Important Links: https://www.linkedin.com/in/brianbolenlssbb/