Management Lessons from Taiichi Ohno: What Every Leader Can Learn from the Man who Invented the Toyota Production System

Good read. Informative

I was very much looking forward to reading about the experience of someone that worked in close proximity to Ohno and also in their Operations Management Consulting Division.I really wanted to give the book 5 stars, but... considering his arrival at Toyota was just after Ohno states that he had a mature system, I expected better.Pros: He offers some insight on working with suppliers and as an expat for your company. He is one of the few that clearly defines that Ohno's primary goal was to create flow and all activity was to resolve disruptions observed. On consultants; that they are under pressure to show quick results and often do things that look good in the short term, but undermine the establishment of TPS. He is rather critical of people starting with 2S or 5S, as was Ohno. ( I was expecting him to mention where it came from.)Cons: Editing - as someone that has read all of Ohno's published books and many of the interviews he gave, the early history Harada provides contradicts Ohno's own work. He attributes many events 10-20 years before they happened, like the supermarkets. His discussion about the andons would lead someone to believe that Toyota or Ohno invented the system...except there is a book in the Toyota City office published in 1931 that clearly describes the andon cord system in Ford's River Rouge plant. If we look at his attribution about kitting, Ford was using this in 1915. On reorganizing the machining equipment for flow... Ueno reorganized a Japanese spinning plant in 1917.Outside of the historical errors that should have been corrected by good editing, I was quite disappointed with how much was missing beyond the observations on flow. I was expecting much more insight from someone in the 2nd generation after the engineers that had refined the Toyota Production System.

I highly recommend this book. It fills in some more pieces of Toyota's past and how they have sustained this system. Like other books, this one adds a couple more pieces to the Toyota puzzle. It is a really quick read- of note - Ohno used the model line concept - Ohno’s goal for kanbans was no more than a WIP Cap of 5 - Ohno’s strategy that led to team leaders and group leaders having 50% of their time free - Also dedicates one or two chapters to what we call process flow analysis or TIPS (following the product) This tool is not utilized in its true form nor understood by most practitioners today.

For any one at all serious about lean thinking, this is an absolute must read - no excuses! Most books describe the "what" of lean, the tools, the cases, the instances. A few explain the "how" the principles and the guidance on how to apply these in various conditions. But al too often the original intent is lost - the "why". Takehiko Harada's great book brings us back to the deep why - why did Taiichi Ohno look so differently at work, and all the efforts his teams made to understand his insights and go beyond. We need more books like this one, and we can start by reading this one, over and over again.

Great book to get inspired by and nice little Golden nuggets to be found every where in the book. A fun little thing: even though the books tells you how to deploy TPS overseas this can be translated into how you should act if you’re responsible for deploying on different locations as well. Defintely worth a read.

good

Takehico Harada is the author of this comprehensive, indeed definitive introduction to the Toyota Production System (TPS) and to the man who invented it, Taiichi Ohno (1912-1990). The book was translated by Brad Schmidt. Briefly, drawing on his experience of introducing a flow production method using a chain conveyor into the assembly line of a textile plant (completed in 1927) with a monthly production capacity of 300 units, Kiichiro Toyoda (1894-1952) introduced this same method into the body production line at Toyota Motor Co., Ltd.'s Koromo Plant (present day Honsha Plant), completed in 1938.by ensuring thorough implementation of jidoka and the Just-in-Time method, Eiji Toyoda (1913-) increased workers' productivity by adding value and realized the Toyota Production System, which enabled Toyota to compete head-on with companies in Europe and the U.S. With strong backing from Eiji Toyoda, Taiichi Ohno helped establish the Toyota Production System, and built the foundation for the Toyota spirit of "making things" by, for example, creating the basic framework for the Just-in-Time method.Harada explains that good kaizen [continuous improvement] "creates an environment in which work is meaningful. To sustain and manage a work environment like this, it is crucial to train people in the management of a Lean organization. Please use this book to that end, and make it your mission to create a workplace where smiles are everywhere and kaizen is happening all the time." He worked for more than 40 years trying to create "that wonderful workplace" at Toyota Motor Corporation, Toyota Motors' Taiwan plant. He is former president.These are among the several dozen passages of greatest interest and value to me, also listed to suggest the scope of Harada's coverage:o Western vs. Japanese culture (Pages x-xi and 121-127)o Flow (1-2, 14-15, 17-20, 32-35, and 101-105)o TPS: Deployment (4-5, 65-67, and 137-139)o Productivity (24-29)o Skilled workers (29-35 and 89-97)o Training (30-35, 52-55, 65-66, and 1q39-149)o Management (39-41, 65-79, and 81-118)o Kanbans (60-63)o TPS and Corporate Culture (66-67, 123-127, and 147-149)o TPS: Roles and responsibilities of management (70--79, 81-118, and 129-132)o TPS: Authority and empowerment (90-97)o Defects (94-96 and 128-131)o Ship set production (114-118)o Resistance to change (123-127 and 145-149)o Abnormality management (127-129)o TPS: Achieving adoption (132-134)Here are the 15 ”sayings” of Taiichi Ohno that Harada wrote down, each of which he discusses.1. "No One Really Understood What I was Saying, So I had to Go to the Gemba ("the real place") and Give Detailed Instructions" (7-11)2. "Kaizen Equals Getting Closer to the Final Process" (11-17)3. "You Need by the [Assembly] Line Only the Parts for the Car You Are Assembling Now" (17-20)4. "Building in Batches Stunts the Growth of Your Operations (Don't Combine Kanbans [improvement systems] and Build a Group of Them" (20-24)5. "Nine Out of Ten, One Out of Ten" (24-29)6. "The Foreman or Leader Is the One Who 'Breaks' the Standard (When You Make an Improvement and You Can Take Out One Person, Give Up Your Best Person" (29-32)7. "Multitasking Means Learning the Next Process -- Keep It Flowing Until You Reach the Last Process" (32-35)8. "What's That Red Circle on the Top Right of the Graph?" (35-39)9. "Are You as the Manager Having Them Do It, or Are They Just Doing It Their Way? Which Is It, Man?"(39-41)10. "Standard Work for the Andon [indicator of a problem] Is, 'Go There When It Flashes'" (42-45)11. "Standard Work Is the Foundation of Kanban" (45-49)12. "When the Worker Pushes the Start Button, He Has Stopped Moving. Can't You Guys Figure Out a Way to Push Star While Still Moving?" (45-52)13. "You Bought an Expensive Machine, and Now You Want an Expensive Foreman or Engineer to Run It? Are You Mad?" (52-55)14. "Engineers in Production Become the Horizontal Threads in the Cloth" (55-60)15. The Lowest Kanban Quantity Should Be Five" (60-63)If you work your way through each of these in a patient and attentive manner, I think you will be amazed by the scope and depth of new understanding that will occur. Albert Einstein once stressed the importance of making everything as simple as possible...but no simpler. That in essence is Lean Thinking, the philosophical foundation of the Toyota Production System.Vince Lombardi once held up a piece of chalk during a Green Bay Packers team meeting and said, “I can beat any offense or defense with this.” Presumably Taiichi Ohno and Takehiko Harada agree with me that the same can be said of lists such as this one. Be they sayings, rules or guidelines, however sensible they may be, they are essentially worthless unless and until they become articles of faith, not for a production process but rather for a way of life.

Die romantische Darstellung von Lean hat mich auch jahrelang geblendet. Nach meiner Japan Reise wollte ich es dann genau wissen. Dieses Buch entzaubert fast alle anderen Bücher zu diesem Thema. "Respekt für Menschen" bedeutet nicht kuscheln und immer coachen wie uns die "üblichen" Lean Gurus glaubhaft machen wollen, sondern ebenso push und den Mitarbeiter challengen.Taichi Ohno war eine richtige "Schubraupe" und bei vielen Kollegen wsl. nicht sehr beliebt. Wohin dieser Weg geführt hat wissen wir alle. Wie sich diese Erkenntnisse im heutigen Umfeld umsetzen lassen, darf jeder für sich selbst entscheiden. Danke für dieses tolle Buch!

Une découverte du TPS de l'intérieur avec des conseils bien pratiques et une découverte de la culture lean au japon qui est un des fondements du Lean