About fifteen years ago, I helped a medium sized residential homebuilder with development training for his management team. It was still relatively early in the lean movement era, and we met for two hours every Wednesday afternoon to discuss how lean philosophy and standard lean tools might apply to the company. The first topic in one of the early sessions was the importance of documenting work processes in order to » Read More
We recently asked the leaders of two idea-driven companies what was the most important characteristic they looked for when hiring or promoting managers. Their surprising answer: Humility. Inditex, best known for its Zara brand of “fast-fashion” stores, is headquartered in A Coruna, Spain, and is the world’s largest clothing company, with over 6,000 stores in 70 countries. Zara’s business model is built » Read More
A few years ago the CEO of a health insurance company asked me to help him set up and launch a high-performing idea system. He knew that his industry was about to go through major changes – Obamacare was just coming down the pike, as were some big changes in Medicaid and Medicare — and his company was going to have to be ready for them. But the problem was that neither he nor anyone else knew what the » Read More
A few years after helping a medium-sized insurance company launch its idea system, I happened to bump into the CEO. I asked him how his company’s idea system was going. “It’s going very well,” he replied. (During the course of our brief conversation, it emerged that the system was getting approximately 25 implemented ideas per employee.) “In fact, if I tried to stop it now, I would probably have a » Read More
Recently, just as the senior management team at a midsize Midwestern company was nearing a decision to set up and launch a high-performance idea system, the CEO expressed some last minute second thoughts. The company had contacted me because its idea system (an online suggestion-box process) was getting less than an idea per person per year. The manager of continuous improvement knew the company could do much » Read More