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The Machine That Changed the World : The Story of Lean Production 59079th Edition

by James P. Womack (Author), Daniel T. Jones (Author), Daniel Roos (Author)
4.6 4.6 out of 5 stars 1,202 ratings
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Based on the Massachusetts Institute of Technology's five-million-dollar, five-year study on the future of the automobile, a groundbreaking analysis of the worldwide move from mass production to lean production.

Japanese companies are sweeping the world, and the Japanese auto industry soars above the competition. Drawing on their in-depth study of the practices of ninety auto assembly plants in seventeen countries and their interviews with individual employees, scholars, and union and government officials, the authors of this compelling study uncover the specific manufacturing techniques behind Japan's success and show how Western industry can implement these innovative methods. The Machine That Changed the World tells the fascinating story of "lean production," a manufacturing system that results in a better, more cost-efficient product, higher productivity, and greater customer loyalty. The hallmarks of lean production are teamwork, communication, and efficient use of resources. And the results are remarkable: cars with one-third the defects, built in half the factory space, using half the man-hours. The Machine That Changed the World explains in concrete terms what lean production is, how it really works, and--as it inevitably spreads beyond the auto industry--its significant global impact.

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  1. ISBN-10
    0060974176
  2. ISBN-13
    978-0060974176
  3. Edition
    59079th
  4. Publisher
    Harper Perennial
  5. Publication date
    November 1, 1991
  6. Language
    English
  7. Dimensions
    5.31 x 0.76 x 8 inches
  8. Print length
    323 pages
  9. See all details
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Editorial Reviews

Review

"The best current book on the changes reshaping manufacturing and the most readable." -- -- Business Week

"The fundamentals of this system are applicable to every industry across the globe...[and] will have a profound impact on human societyit will truly change the world." -- New York Times Magazine

About the Author


Daniel Roos, Ph.D., is director of the International Motor Vehicle Program at MIT. James P. Womack, Ph.D., is the research director of the program, and Daniel T. Jones is the program's European research director.

Product details

  • Publisher ‏ : ‎ Harper Perennial; 59079th edition (November 1, 1991)
  • Language ‏ : ‎ English
  • Paperback ‏ : ‎ 323 pages
  • ISBN-10 ‏ : ‎ 0060974176
  • ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 978-0060974176
  • Item Weight ‏ : ‎ 8 ounces
  • Dimensions ‏ : ‎ 5.31 x 0.76 x 8 inches
  • Customer Reviews:
    4.6 4.6 out of 5 stars 1,202 ratings

About the authors

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  1. Daniel I. Jones

    Daniel I. Jones

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    Daniel T. Jones is a Professor at the Cardiff Business School and has acted as consultant to a wide and international range of companies operating in Europe. He lives in Hereford.

    See more on the author's page
  2. Daniel Roos

    Daniel Roos

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    Discover more of the author’s books, see similar authors, read author blogs and more

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  3. James P. Womack

    James P. Womack

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    Management expert James P. Womack, Ph.D., is the founder and senior advisor to the Lean Enterprise Institute, Inc., a nonprofit training, publishing, conference, and management research company chartered in August 1997 to advance a set of ideas known as lean production and lean thinking, based initially on Toyota’s business system and now being extended to an entire lean management system.

    The intellectual basis for the Cambridge, MA-based Institute is described in a series of books and articles co-authored by Womack and Daniel Jones over the past 20 years. The most widely known books are: The Machine That Changed the World (Macmillan/Rawson Associates, 1990), Lean Thinking (Simon & Schuster, 1996), Lean Solutions (Simon & Schuster, 2005), and Seeing The Whole Value Stream (Lean Enterprise Institute, 2011). Articles include: "From Lean Production to the Lean Enterprise" (Harvard Business Review, March-April, 1994), "Beyond Toyota: How to Root Out Waste and Pursue Perfection" (Harvard Business Review, September-October, 1996), “Lean Consumption” (Harvard Business Review, March-April, 2005).

    Womack received a B.A. in political science from the University of Chicago in 1970, a master's degree in transportation systems from Harvard in 1975, and a Ph.D. in political science from MIT in 1982 (for a dissertation on comparative industrial policy in the U.S., Germany, and Japan). During the period 1975-1991, he was a full-time research scientist at MIT directing a series of comparative studies of world manufacturing practices. As research director of MIT’s International Motor Vehicle Program, Womack led the research team that coined the term “lean production” to describe Toyota’s business system.

    Womack served as the Institute's chairman and CEO from 1997 until 2010 when he was succeeded by John Shook.

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Customer reviews

4.6 out of 5 stars
1,202 global ratings

Customers say

Customers find the book very interesting and helpful to understand lean production. They also appreciate the author's accurate description of the Toyota way and comparison with older production concepts. Readers also describe the writing style as well-written and detailed.

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ContentWriting styleCraftsmanship
66 customers mention "Content"61 positive5 negative

Customers find the book very interesting, handy, and spot-on. They also say it's an extraordinary classic that opens the Toyota Production System to the world. Readers also say the book is thorough, helpful to understand lean production, and relevant for today's manufacturing operations.

"I love his book and bought another one for a relative. This is real research and reads less like management book but like a non fiction story...." Read more

"...to all manner of industries. The book is well written and interesting even though it is based on an MIT study of global trends in the auto..." Read more

"...The book provides many comparisons to assist the reader in understanding..." Read more

"...This book is still quite relevant even in today's car market, or any industry for that matter when one considers moving to a lean environment...." Read more

7 customers mention "Writing style"7 positive0 negative

Customers find the book well-written and detailed.

"...adapted from automotive to all manner of industries. The book is well written and interesting even though it is based on an MIT study of..." Read more

"...The writing style of the book is comprehensive enough to be useful for current managers, yet readable enough to be engaging for those who are new..." Read more

"A very useful book that's written in a very clear way. It may seem that the content is simple, BUT IT IS NOT...." Read more

"Well written and very detailed description of Lean vs. Mass Production. Excellent history of automotive industry and how it is evolving." Read more

5 customers mention "Craftsmanship"5 positive0 negative

Customers appreciate the craftsmanship in the book. They say it's a great quality book.

"Received exactly what I ordered. Excellent condition." Read more

"...The attention & fame it got bear witness to the quality of the contents. As we say in dutch, 'a good wine doesn't need laurels'." Read more

"While the book was published in the 1980s, it is still very valid. It's afterword addresses some of the changes in the intervening years...." Read more

"...They said the condition was very good to good. A couple of the very good ones were more like fair, and some of the very good ones were excellent...." Read more

Top reviews from the United States

Holden McGroin
5.0 out of 5 stars Loved this book
Reviewed in the United States on February 10, 2019
Verified Purchase
I love his book and bought another one for a relative. This is real research and reads less like management book but like a non fiction story.

I loved learning about the history of car manufacturers and how the business practices established by Ford and GM are why car dealers act the way they do in America. It is a disgrace.

Japanese car dealers seem to do the right thing. Very enlightening about how they view their customers vs how the Americans do.
3 people found this helpful
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Jordan Henderson
5.0 out of 5 stars Really makes you think...
Reviewed in the United States on January 11, 2024
Verified Purchase
I read the book and thoroughly enjoyed it. It was a lot to digest at first but once it started clicking with me I realized it really makes you think. I actually own a 2016 Toyota Camry and it made me look at my Camry in a different way as far as looking at what it took to actually make and produce my car. From tracing it not only to the dealership I bought it from, but now thinking about from when it was designed to the part supplier to the assembly to the paint to all the 10,000 plus parts that are apart of my car. It gives you more of an appreciation for the manufacturing of vehicles. And I myself work in a manufacturing plant, though not for auto. So I am able to look at my job and see the elements of Lean production that we have, though for the most part, we are, in fact a Mass production plant, at least according to how this book broke down each. I will say that this is a great book for anyone in any kind of manufacturing industry as you will get a sense of how production works through all phases. And maybe take some of what you learn and possibly recommend it to your supervisors and managers which may improve things at your own plant possibly.
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J. head
4.0 out of 5 stars a Manufacturing Mustread
Reviewed in the United States on April 24, 2003
Verified Purchase
The Machine That Changed the World; The Story of Lean Production
A great book that although becoming a little outdated portrays the ongoing trends in the automobile production industry in three major cultural areas.
The three areas are;the Asian lean production (Toyota) v.s. the American system,(mass production) v.s. the European craftsman system. On a larger scale it will and is affecting manufacturing everywhere.
Henry Ford was the founder of the American mass production system, and Ford was very successful adopting it to the aircraft and steel industries. American companies adopted this system and it is one of the main reasons for American pre-eminence in many industries worldwide. Toyota has become the founder of the Lean system of manufacturing. Most of the
early adherents to this system were other large Japanese companies, and responsible for the Japanese manufacturing miracle since the 1960's, as it was adapted from automotive to all manner of industries.
The book is well written and interesting even though it is based on an MIT study of global trends in the auto industry. I would like to see an update to this book. The one anomaly I see is the German Automobile industry. If Japan and Korea have some of the most efficient auto manufacturing plants in the world and
North America is becoming more competitive, what is happening in Europe comes as no surprise. Many European automakers have yet to fully embrace American mass production techniques and are now faced with the greater efficiencies of Lean
production. The book does not explain in my mind the success of the German Auto industry. It seems to be the one exception to the rule.
17 people found this helpful
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Kindle Customer
5.0 out of 5 stars Great book
Reviewed in the United States on April 3, 2021
Verified Purchase
I can't believe that I waited so long to read this book. For someone like me, who is not an expert in just-in-time or lean production, this book offered the chance to learn quite a bit
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Laurie Kahn
5.0 out of 5 stars Great Value
Reviewed in the United States on May 26, 2023
Verified Purchase
Received exactly what I ordered. Excellent condition.
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Bill B.
3.0 out of 5 stars This seminal book on Lean Production gives short-shrift to the real driver of productivity and quality.
Reviewed in the United States on July 22, 2014
Verified Purchase
While this is THE classic book on lean production, it suffers from two problems. First, the topic is lean production but the book is based on research focussed exclusively on data from automobile assembly plants rather than broader data across different types of manufacturing. This forces the authors to treat the best automobile assembly plant as the best model for lean production. Had the authors looked beyond the automobile assembly industry, they might have come to a different conclusion. But the problem is worse than that. Not only did they use only one set of data from one industry, they also allowed bias to color their analysis. They were biased toward product design, production engineering and JIT. They give short-shrift to the real key. The original researcher for this study was John Krafcik (he later became the President and CEO of Hyundai Motor America). In his own report of the data he pointed out that the skills and motivation of the work force has the greatest explanatory power of assembly plant performance. Yet this is given remarkably little attention in this book. Had the authors look beyond the automobile assembly even as nearby as the turnaround at Harley Davidson this focus on people might have gotten much more attention. In the case of Harley, there was no way to miss that the key was the people in every factory floor function. Get the people environment right, and everything else will sort itself out. Get it wrong and your ability to perform with high productivity and quality deteriorates. None of the plants studied actually does an exemplary job with people. Early in the book the authors insert several paragraphs on how the lean environment might increase employee stress, create anxiety over making costly mistakes, might cause the employee to miss getting a specific enough skill to be marketable outside the company, and worry that "workers may feel they have reached a dead end at an early point in their career." Clearly, the authors did not 'get-it' when it comes to people in this environment. But, they've done well for themselves promoting the other aspects of lean, and, no doubt, had very positive impacts on company's bottom lines. When they get the people equation right, they'll be even more potent.
16 people found this helpful
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Todd C Cheng
5.0 out of 5 stars Timeless
Reviewed in the United States on September 1, 2022
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As much as a great historic analysis of lean and mass production as a template to commission a synthesis of the growth and propagation of a concept across cultures.
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Top reviews from other countries

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Heverton Barbosa do Nascimento
5.0 out of 5 stars Muito bom!
Reviewed in Brazil on March 31, 2024
Verified Purchase
Livro ideal para entender como iniciou a metodologia Lean manufacturing.
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Javier Gomez
5.0 out of 5 stars Excelente libro
Reviewed in Mexico on September 1, 2023
Verified Purchase
Contiene la información solicitada excelente libro
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Craig Shirley
5.0 out of 5 stars Excellent
Reviewed in Canada on April 17, 2023
Verified Purchase
Worth reading and keeping in your library.
One person found this helpful
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Olga Krylova
5.0 out of 5 stars Old but good
Reviewed in Germany on November 4, 2023
Verified Purchase
About the ins and outs of lean vs mass production that started in the automotive sector and gradually took upon the world, proving right the initial theory of lean approach's efficiency in product, production, supply chain, and beyond. Productivity, quality, modularity, agility, craftsmanship vs standardisation. There must also be a book out there exploring how lean integrates in different cultural contexts (geography and company specific). 'Truly lean plant has two key org characteristics: It transfers the max number of tasks and responsibilities to those workers actually adding value to the car on the line, and it has in place a system for detecting defects that quickly traces every problem, once discovered, to its ultimate cause.'
Interestingly, this essentially history of automotive industry touches on climate change that the industry heavily contributes to and levers to overcome market saturation like self-driving technology.
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fafa70
5.0 out of 5 stars The Machine That Changed the World:
Reviewed in Italy on March 9, 2023
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Ottimo libro da leggere
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