Customer Reviews

Journey to Lean: Making Operational Change Stick

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As a Japanese management consultant working in the U.S, I was curious how good this book is...and found out that this book contains all the essential elements of lean production and its philosophy. Very good introduction to understand all the basics. It seems many of the concepts and tools were customized so that U.S. people can better understand the concepts...but to be honest, they are a bit different from the original philosophy that Ohno Taichi, the founder of Toyota Production System, had written in his books. I would strongly encourage to read the original books written by Ohno...it is always better to read the original books if you really want to understand the REAL concepts. But again, this book "Journey to Lean" is a very good introcution for begginers.

This book take you through the basic consepts of lean. And it does so in an easy and interesting way. The examples in the book are well constructed and told. This is a book written by persons who have practise lean themeselves. It is a great book for an manager who want to learn about lean or a student that would like to get some " real life" understanding of lean compared to other books out there which are to theoretical.

A major consulting company demonstrating that lean has become main stream. l enjoyed reading the book, its lucid and very well written.

However, the customer is strangely absent for some reason and it does take a pedestrian, slightly pedantic and bureaucratic approach to organisational change for my taste, But its a journey after all.

I detect a high degree of bias from the application of Lean manufacturing techniques into the world of services which is heavy handed and inappropriate. Having seen the approach outlined in this book implemented I am slightly uneasy about its assumptions about people motivation and control.

All that said, if you are in manufacturing, it was a good read and a good introduction to the lean journey concept, Just ease off the micro-control fixation and it will work much better.