Lean Thinking: Banish Waste and Create Wealth in Your Corporation, Revised and Updated [Hardcover]

James P. Womack (Author), Daniel T. Jones (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: June 3, 2003

Expanded, updated, and more relevant than ever, this bestselling business classic by two internationally renowned management analysts describes a business system for the twenty-first century that supersedes the mass production system of Ford, the financial control system of Sloan, and the strategic system of Welch and GE. It is based on the Toyota (lean) model, which combines operational excellence with value-based strategies to produce steady growth through a wide range of economic conditions.

In contrast with the crash-and-burn performance of companies trumpeted by business gurus in the 1990s, the firms profiled in Lean Thinking -- from tiny Lantech to midsized Wiremold to niche producer Porsche to gigantic Pratt & Whitney -- have kept on keeping on, largely unnoticed, along a steady upward path through the market turbulence and crushed dreams of the early twenty-first century. Meanwhile, the leader in lean thinking -- Toyota -- has set its sights on leadership of the global motor vehicle industry in this decade.

Instead of constantly reinventing business models, lean thinkers go back to basics by asking what the customer really perceives as value. (It's often not at all what existing organizations and assets would suggest.) The next step is to line up value-creating activities for a specific product along a value stream while eliminating activities (usually the majority) that don't add value. Then the lean thinker creates a flow condition in which the design and the product advance smoothly and rapidly at the pull of the customer (rather than the push of the producer). Finally, as flow and pull are implemented, the lean thinker speeds up the cycle of improvement in pursuit of perfection. The first part of this book describes each of these concepts and makes them come alive with striking examples.

Lean Thinking clearly demonstrates that these simple ideas can breathe new life into any company in any industry in any country. But most managers need guidance on how to make the lean leap in their firm. Part II provides a step-by-step action plan, based on in-depth studies of more than fifty lean companies in a wide range of industries across the world.

Even those readers who believe they have embraced lean thinking will discover in Part III that another dramatic leap is possible by creating an extended lean enterprise for each of their product families that tightly links value-creating activities from raw materials to customer.

In Part IV, an epilogue to the original edition, the story of lean thinking is brought up-to-date with an enhanced action plan based on the experiences of a range of lean firms since the original publication of Lean Thinking.

Lean Thinking does not provide a new management "program" for the one-minute manager. Instead, it offers a new method of thinking, of being, and, above all, of doing for the serious long-term manager -- a method that is changing the world.

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review

In the revised and updated edition of Lean Thinking: Banish Waste and Create Wealth in Your Corporation, authors James P. Womack and Daniel T. Jones provide a thoughtful expansion upon their value-based business system based on the Toyota model. Along the way they update their action plan in light of new research and the increasing globalization of manufacturing, and they revisit some of their key case studies (most of which still derive, however, from the automotive, aerospace, and other manufacturing industries).

The core of the lean model remains the same in the new edition. All businesses must define the "value" that they produce as the product that best suits customer needs. The leaders must then identify and clarify the "value stream," the nexus of actions to bring the product through problems solving, information management, and physical transformation tasks. Next, "lean enterprise" lines up suppliers with this value stream. "Flow" traces the product across departments. "Pull" then activates the flow as the business re-orients towards the pull of the customer's needs. Finally, with the company reengineered towards its core value in a flow process, the business re-orients towards "perfection," rooting out all the remaining muda (Japanese for "waste") in the system.

Despite the authors' claims to "actionable principles for creating lasting value in any business during any business conditions," the lean model is not demonstrated with broad applications in the service or retail industries. But those manager's whose needs resonate with those described in the Lean Thinking case studies will find a host of practical guidelines for streamlining their processes and achieving manufacturing efficiencies. --Patrick O'Kelley

Review

Peter F. Drucker Author of The Post-Capitalist Society The Machine That Changed the World is a very important book. I am impressed.

Business Week The best current book on the changes reshaping manufacturing, and the most readable, too...conveys a very human sense of managers constrained by limited resources yet trying to do better.

Fortune A new and coherent thesis about automotive production...[the authors] back up their conclusions with unique statistical measures that are authoritative, extremely timely, and highly revealing. Think of this book as another step in the decade-long process of getting the attention of recalcitrant mass producers.

Financial Times A revealing and compellingly readable account of Japan's achievement in revolutionizing manufacturing....An eye-opener even for those who already knew Japan didn't do it all with robots.

Automotive News This is a book of great understanding, and of hope. It shows how to create an industrial world in which workers share the challenges and satisfactions of the business. It's a world in which assemblers communicate with suppliers and dealers in a way that improves life for all of them. Read it.

Philip Caldwell Chairman and CEO, Ford Motor Company, 1980-1985 Truly remarkable....The most comprehensive, instructive, mind-stretching and provocative analysis of any major industry I have ever known. Why pay others huge consulting fees? Just read this book.

Richard J. Schonberger Author of World Class Manufacturing: The Next Decade The manufacturing book of the nineties.

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Hardcover: 396 pages
• Publisher: Free Press; 2nd edition (June 3, 2003)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0743249275
• ISBN-13: 978-0743249270
• Product Dimensions: 6.4 x 1.3 x 9.4 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.2 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (45 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #5,071 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
  • #3 in Books > Business & Investing > Management & Leadership > Quality Control
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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

131 of 150 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars Great, if you like stories about business., May 19, 2004

By 

Greg Stein (California) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Lean Thinking : Banish Waste and Create Wealth in Your Corporation, 2nd Edition Revised (Audio CD)

I'm not sure who the audience is for Lean Thinking. Call me naïve, but I assumed it was written by Womack and Jones to help organizations analyze their business processes and eliminate muda (Japanese for "waste"), thereby improving overall performance. However, after reading almost 250 pages of anecdotal success stories, the chapter entitled "Action Plan," where one would assume resides the punch-line of the text, I was met by the profound advice to "Get the knowledge" by hiring one of the numerous experts in North America, Europe or Japan, and read some of the "vast literature" available on lean techniques. Reminds me of the Steve Martin joke where he tells you how to be a millionaire. "First, get a million dollars."

After reading Lean Thinking, I'm struck by the irony that while the authors recommend removing waste from the manner by which your products are delivered to the end customer, they don't take their own advice. The text could have been distilled from 384 pages down to five or six, since there's no real substantive instruction on how to implement lean principles. Then again, maybe I completely misinterpreted the intent of the authors as to their audience and it really was written for the business historian who enjoys reading about how Pratt & Whitney started in 1855. That must be it, because after I ponder the title, I realize that Lean Thinking is for just that, thinking. What I really wanted was a book entitled Lean Doing.

13 of 14 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A Business Paradox: Less Really Can Achieve More, November 3, 2003

By 

Robert Morris (Dallas, Texas) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Lean Thinking: Banish Waste and Create Wealth in Your Corporation, Revised and Updated (Hardcover)

This is a new and expanded second edition of a book first published in 1996. Of special interest to me was what Womack and Jones had to say in the preface regarding what has since happened to the companies previously discussed. Apparently lean thinking has enabled Toyota, Wiremold, Porsche, Lantech, and Pratt & Whitney to sustain operational excellence and economic prosperity.

Briefly, how do Womack and Jones define lean thinking? It is the opposite of muda (a Japanese) word for anything which consumes resources without creating value. In a word, waste. Lean thinking is lean because "it provides a way to do more and more with less and less -- less human effort, less equipment, less time, and less space -- while coming closer and closer to providing customers with exactly what they want." Lean thinking is thus a process of thought, not an expedient response or a stop-gap solution. The challenge, according to Womack and Jones, is to convert muda into real, quantifiable value and the process to achieve that worthy objective requires everyone within an organization (regardless of size or nature) to be actively involved in that process. Once again, in this new edition they address questions such as these:

1. How can certain "simple, actionable principles" enable any business to create lasting value during any business conditions?

2. How can these principles be applied most effectively in real businesses, regardless of size or nature?

3. How can a relentless focus on the value stream for every product create "a true lean enterprise that optimizes the value created for the customer while minimizing time, cost, and errors"?

In Part IV, Womack and Jones update the continuing advance of of lean thinking. They rack the trend in inventory turns and the progress of their profiled companies. Also of special interest to me was the discussion of what Womack and Jones have learned since 1996 which probably explains why they introduce a new range of implementation tools support value stream mapping initiatives and thereby "to raise consciousness about value and its components, leading to action."

Obviously, even if everyone involved within a given organization is committed to lean thinking, to creating value while (and by) eliminating waste, the process requires specific strategies and tactics to succeed. Hence the importance of the last chapter in this book., "Institutionalizing the Revolution." I presume to suggest that the process of lean thinking never ends. Inevitably, success creates abundance; abundance often permits waste. I also presume to suggest that priorities must first be set so that the implementation of lean thinking process does not inadvertently create or neglect waste in areas which influence the creation of value for customers.

Although highly readable, this is not an "easy read" because it requires rigorous thinking about what is most important to a given organization, rigorous thinking about the root causes (rather than the symptoms) of that organization's problems, and rigorous thinking about the most prudent use of resources to eliminate those problems. Because of the importance of the material which Womack and Jones share, I strongly recommend that decision-makers read and then re-read this book before getting together to exchange reactions to it. Out of that discussion, I hope, will come both a collective commitment to lean thinking and the personal determination of each executive to apply what she or he has learned from this book in operational areas where waste has most diminished value.

14 of 17 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars Not one of Womack's best works, May 7, 2006

By 

Lean Entusiast "Avid reader" - See all my reviews

This review is from: Lean Thinking: Banish Waste and Create Wealth in Your Corporation, Revised and Updated (Hardcover)

I personally do a vast amount of reading with lean enterprise being of special interest. Womack has done some great work, but this is a "tough read" even for serious lean enthusiasts. I typically finish a book of this length within 2-3 days then re-read it and highlight. It literally took me 11 weeks because I was lulled to a point in which reading further would be of no benefit and would have to put it back on the shelf and revisit it days later. I realize that scholarly and business writing is not especially exciting as I am constantly reading and doing research but this one was tough even for me, an avid reader.