Each month new articles, book reviews, and other content are added to the Superfactory website. The new content is featured in the free monthly e-newsletter which goes out to 50,000 subscribers worldwide, and we will also post a monthly heads-up on this blog.
New content in July includes:
The featured article is from Bob Emiliani and is titled Can Lean Exit the Tool Age? The following is a brief excerpt, and you can read the entire article here.
Lean management advocates have recently begun concerted efforts to push Lean out of the tool age and help people understand Lean as a management system. This article examines what happened when the advocates of an earlier system of management, Scientific Management, sought to change the widely-held view that it was nothing more than a set of tools to improve efficiency. Knowledge of their efforts might help us succeed, provided Lean has not already suffered too much damage.
The Featured Blog Post is Dan Markovitz's recent piece titled The Obesity Epidemic. The following is a brief excerpt, and you can read the entire post here.
Government policies over the years have led to overproduction of this crop, from 4 billion bushels in 1970 to 10 billion bushels today. At the same time, because supply exceeds demand and prices are so low, federal government payments to farmers -- for corn alone -- comes to slightly more than $4 billion. There are plenty of lean lessons here, from the folly of "push" production (even in food) to government muda. But what's really interesting is Pollan's view of the result of this overproduction.
The featured book this month is Lean Cost Management by Jim Huntzinger. The following is a brie
f summary, and you can learn more or order the book by clicking here.
Huntzinger has marshalled little-known historical evidence to show how accounting figures came to be a very misleading way to manage a manufacturing company. He proposes abolishing meaningless figures too abstract from reality. Where cost figures are needed, derive them from simple parameter and process-based cost models that correspond with physical reality. This change in thinking opens an escape hatch from the traps that prevent companies from addressing their 21st century challenges.
We continually update the other major sections of the website, including:
- Events Calendar: a listing of lean excellence seminars, workshops, training, and conferences worldwide
- Topic Information: Summaries and resources on over 40 enterprise excellence topics.
- History of Excellence: A growing timeline of notable events that helped shape current-day enterprise excellence
- Online E-Learning Center: Fourteen interactive online presentations on the core concepts of lean manufacturing.
- PowerPoint Presentations: Over 50 downloadable PowerPoint presentations on lean manufacturing, quality, enterprise, and safety concepts.
- Factory Toolbox: Almost 300 downloadable forms, procedure templates, assessments, and tools to help you not reinvent the wheel.
- Tools and Assessments: Downloadable assessment tools.
- Virtual Factory Tours: Web and streaming video tours of over 100 factories.
We are always looking for new articles and other content. Contact us via the Superfactory website if you would like to contribute to our knowledge base.