Lean Blog Interviews - Healthcare, Manufacturing, Business, and Leadership

John Gallagher, Lean and The Uncommon Leader

CEO of Growing Champions, LLC
Show notes: https://www.leanblog.org/426
My guest for Episode #426 of the Lean Blog Interviews Podcast is John Gallagher, Founder and CEO of Growing Champions, LLC, an Executive Coach, Mentor, and Consultant. John was with Simpler Consulting for over a decade after being an operations manager and a division president for two different companies.
He's also the host of a new podcast called The Uncommon Leader. I'll be John's guest in an episode to be released on October 19th.
Today, we talk about topics and questions including:
Where did you first get exposed to Lean?
Why were you skeptical about Lean at first?
Came from MRP batch & queue world
Rapid Improvement Event or Rapid Planning Event?
His first sensei, the late Bill Moffitt
“Comfort the afflicted or afflict the comforted?”
Who were some of your key mentors?
Lean Thinking was a key book, the first book he read on Lean
Being an operations manager vs. a division president… what did you learn from those roles?
Applying Lean to residential real estate sales
Healthcare? Patients aren't cars?? Addressing that? Cookbook medicine?
“Unique care delivered in a standard way”
Tell us about the podcast…  inspired by Tony Dungy's book
Who have been some of your guests? — Including Paul De Chant
Who are some of the “uncommon leaders” you have worked for, worked with, or coached? What made them uncommon?
Posts I was reminded of
Lenny Walls, my trainer
Central Intelligence post
Sushi incrementalism post
Coaching work? Lean coach to exec coach?
The podcast is sponsored by Stiles Associates, now in their 30th year of business. They are the go-to Lean recruiting firm serving the manufacturing, private equity, and healthcare industries. Learn more.
This podcast is part of the #LeanCommunicators network. 

Katie Anderson on Breaking the Telling Habit

Show notes, links, and video: https://www.markgraban.com/425
My guest for Episode #425 of the Lean Blog Interviews Podcast is Katie Anderson, who is joining us for the seventh time as a guest.
Katie is, of course, the author of the book Learning to Lead, Leading to Learn: Lessons from Toyota Leader Isao Yoshino on a Lifetime of Continuous Learning. It has now been out over a year as eBook and paperback, and the audiobook is now available.
Today, we sketched out a few topics for a fun conversation. First, we talk about “breaking the telling habit” (get Katie's free guide). When do leaders have to “tell”? Does it get annoying when you only ask questions?
You'll also hear about how Katie “pulled the andon cord” (virtually) when she had a concern about the sound of me typing some notes. So, we'll talk about countermeasures and such related to that, and you'll hear our problem solving minds at work.
Katie then shares a story about the use of “Process Behavior Charts” at a non-profit organization. I share a story about seeing what appeared to be a “signal” in the listener metrics for the My Favorite Mistake podcast, so we again chat about problem solving and causal analysis.
We also talk the “Leading to Learn Accelerator” program that she's running soon.
And I tell an awful joke about asking questions. I'm sorry.
The podcast is sponsored by Stiles Associates, now in their 30th year of business. They are the go-to Lean recruiting firm serving the manufacturing, private equity, and healthcare industries. Learn more.
This podcast is part of the #LeanCommunicators network. 

Balaji Reddie, Founder of the Deming Forum India

Show notes: https://www.leanblog.org/424
My guest for Episode #424 of the Lean Blog Interviews Podcast is Balaji Reddie, the founder of The Deming Forum of India.
An engineer by trade, Balaji was exposed to W. Edwards Deming's ideas through his father, then became highly interested in the Deming Philosophy after a chance introduction to the founder of the British Deming Association, Dr. Henry R. Neave, who became Balaji's mentor.
As it says in his bio:
“Balaji's contributions have been featured in textbooks and coursework on Quality and the Deming Philosophy. He holds a Degree in Electrical Engineering from COEP (the Government College of Engineering in Pune), and a Master of Science in Quality Management from BITS (Birla Institute of Technology & Science).”
Topics and questions:
Tell us more about your professional background
In his factory, had a “quality section” but not department – what's the difference?
1991 was a key year for India – opened up outside investment and foreign products
Xerox 5-day Leadership for Quality course
Wanted to know where this all began, learned of Deming & Juran
What was your first exposure to Dr. Deming and/or his work?
His father went to Japan in 1964
“Juran had answers, Deming asked questions”
Recommends Managerial Breakthrough from 1964
14 points were for an American audience, the Japanese didn't have them
Red Bead Experiment – Deming used in 1940s to teach sampling
“Respect for people” – Deming was talking about this a long time back
Tutored under Henry Neave – tell us about him — The Deming Dimension book
“The guru is the person who shows us the way… asks questions but maybe doesn't give the answers” 
The Deming Forum of India – 1999 founding
Unique properties or qualities of Indian companies?
I hope you enjoy the conversation. We managed to have a lot of laughs, even though we're talking about serious topics.
The podcast is sponsored by Stiles Associates, now in their 30th year of business. They are the go-to Lean recruiting firm serving the manufacturing, private equity, and healthcare industries. Learn more.
This podcast is part of the #LeanCommunicators network. 

Laura Kriska, the First American Woman to Work at Honda HQ in Japan

My guest for Episode #423 of the Lean Blog Interviews Podcast is Laura Kriska, a Cross-Cultural Consultant and the author of the book The Business of We: The Proven Three-Step Process for Closing the Gap Between Us and Them in Your Workplace.
Notes: https://www.leanblog.org/423
She was previously my guest on Episode 61 of the “My Favorite Mistake” podcast.
Laura was previously the author of the book The Accidental Office Lady: An American Woman in Corporate Japan, a book about her time as the first American woman to work for Honda in Tokyo, Japan. We talk about those experiences and so much more today.
Topics and questions:
How did you get to become the first American woman to work at Honda HQ in Japan? 
What was it like working in the Ohio factory? 
Quality Circles
Kaizen — We can always do things better
What was an “office lady”?
Adjustments to the Japanese working culture?
You initiated a Quality Circle around the uniform for office ladies, tell us about that…
“Let's Abolish Women's Uniforms”
Use of data?
Being careful with assumptions
Studied it for a year
What was the outcome?
You describe Cultural laziness (now, “corporate carelessness”) – what do you mean by that? Can this apply to somebody who is new to a company culture, too??
I hope you enjoy the conversation.
The podcast is sponsored by Stiles Associates, now in their 30th year of business. They are the go-to Lean recruiting firm serving the manufacturing, private equity, and healthcare industries. Learn more.
This podcast is part of the #LeanCommunicators network. 

Brant Cooper on Being ”Disruption Proof” in Pandemic Times & Beyond

Author of Disruption Proof and The Lean Entrepreneur
My guest for Episode #422 of the Lean Blog Interviews Podcast is Brant Cooper, appearing for the third time and the first time solo. Brant previously appeared, alongside Patrick Vlaskovits, in Episodes 99 and 162.
Show notes: https://www.leanblog.org/422
Brant is the author of the upcoming book, Disruption Proof: Empower People, Create Value, Drive Change, due out in late October, but is available for pre-order now.
Brant is The New York Times bestselling author of the book The Lean Entrepreneur (now in a 2nd Edition) and he's CEO and founder of the firm Moves the Needle.
He is also organizing a virtual summit — the Endless Disruption Summit — on Sept 30.
Topics and questions:
“One thing in life is certain: Disruption is the new norm.” — Why is that increasingly so?
How can a company become disruption proof?
What's a good example of an Industrial Age company that has transformed to thrive in the Digital Age?
Lessons from the pandemic?
Working from home and now what?
Empathy and restaurant signs
The entire world is understaffed?
The hospital sign about your energy and the workplace
The 5Es: Empathy, Exploration, Evidence, Equillibrium, and Ethics
His experiences in healthcare — cancer
The people are amazing
Ransomware attack affected his radiation care
I hope you enjoy the conversation.
The podcast is sponsored by Stiles Associates, now in their 30th year of business. They are the go-to Lean recruiting firm serving the manufacturing, private equity, and healthcare industries. Learn more.
This podcast is part of the #LeanCommunicators network. 

BONUS: John Shook, Revisited from 2009 - Managing to Learn and A3 Problem Solving

We've been on hiatus over the summer here, so I've taken a look back at some of the older episodes from the podcast archives, while being on a bit of a hiatus from recording new episodes. New episodes will be coming again in September
Today we're looking back at the episode that I did with John Shook.
It was Episode #56, released in January 2009.
I hope you enjoy our discussion -- I think it's just as relevant today as it was then even though his book Managing to Learn has been available for more than a decade (it was new when we did this episode).
I had a chance to talk with John a few months back and I'm hoping to do a new episode with him sometime soon.
The podcast is sponsored by Stiles Associates, now in their 30th year of business. They are the go-to Lean recruiting firm serving the manufacturing, private equity, and healthcare industries. Learn more.
This podcast is part of the #LeanCommunicators network. 
 

BONUS: David Meier's "Favorite Mistakes" at Toyota and His Distillery

I don't always share new episodes of the "My Favorite Mistake" podcast with you here, but when I do... it's a Lean practitioner.
Today, that guest is David Meier, a former Toyota team member and leader, author of two https://amzn.to/3xPHcre with Jeffrey Liker, and a TPS/Lean consultant. Oh, and he has a great distillery in Kentucky now called Glenn's Creek Distillery.
Toyota / Lean topics include:
More background about what you learned at Toyota
Hard for people to talk about mistakes, admitting they're human
Blame vs. responsibility? 
Toyota teaches that leaders have responsibility 
Blame with punishment = "accountability"?
Punishment replaced with learning and improvement?
Hard on the process, not on the people
Mr. Yoshino's mix up with the paint area (Episode #30)
My episode about the nearly lost episodes (Episode #16)
Mistakes made in the distillery
Mistakes about mistakes?

BONUS: Jamie Flinchbaugh, Revisited from 2006

Author of The Hitchhiker's Guide to Lean
We've been on hiatus over the summer here, so I've taken a look back at some of the older episodes from the podcast archives, while being on a bit of a hiatus from recording new episodes.
Today we're looking back at my first episodes with my good friend, Jamie Flinchbaugh.
Show notes: https://www.leanblog.org/2021/08/podcast-bonus-episode-jamie-flinchbaugh-revisited-from-2006/
My voice has gone on hiatus this week… since he can’t talk, he asked me to record this intro for a podcast where we look back at some episodes I’ve been involved in.
Jamie was my guest for Episodes 5 and 6 back in 2006, then again for Episode 10 that year. In 2008, he turned the tables and interviewed me in Episode 50. Then, I interviewed Jamie in Episodes 64 and 261, and Jamie turned the tables once again to interview me, in Episode 316, about my book “Measures of Success.”
In April 2019, Jamie and I started the “Lean Whiskey” podcast and we plan on recording episode #29 of that series on Sunday… if my voice is back to normal.
Today, we’re sharing Episodes 5 and 6 together. The episodes were shorter back then, so combined it’s just under 30 minutes of audio, talking about Waste and the Role of Leadership.
I hope you enjoy our discussion from 2006, lmost exactly 15 years ago. As always, thanks for listening, and please do check out “Lean Whiskey.”
The podcast is sponsored by Stiles Associates, now in their 30th year of business. They are the go-to Lean recruiting firm serving the manufacturing, private equity, and healthcare industries. Learn more.
This podcast is part of the #LeanCommunicators network. 
 

Ryan McCormack on His “Operational Excellence Mixtapes” & More

Links and show notes: https://www.leanblog.org/421
We've been on hiatus over the summer here, but I did a live streaming video the other day with my friend Ryan McCormack, who regular readers of this blog will recognize as the creator of the bi-weekly "Operational Excellence Mixtape" emails that he allows me to publish here on the Lean Blog.
He was also my guest for Episode 12 of the "Lean Whiskey" podcast.
In this 30-minute discussion, Ryan and I chat about:
Why did you start the "mixtapes"?
What are some favorite books and podcasts that you have highlighted recently?
What have been the transferrable Lean lessons going into healthcare and now back out into other settings?
Best Thing / Worst Thing -- What's the best thing about doing OpEx work? The worst thing?
I hope you enjoy the conversation.
The podcast is sponsored by Stiles Associates, now in their 30th year of business. They are the go-to Lean recruiting firm serving the manufacturing, private equity, and healthcare industries. Learn more.
 
This podcast is part of the #LeanCommunicators network. 
 

BONUS: In Memoriam -- Podcast Guests Who Have Passed Away

During our summer hiatus from releasing new podcast episodes, we're looking back at previous episodes of the podcast.
Today, sadly, we're taking a look back at guests from the past 15 years who have since passed away. May their wisdom and legacy live on through these episodes, as we think about them today.
Links to the episodes and more can be found at https://www.leanblog.org/inmemoriam