Knowing the history of continuous improvement means knowing about the people who shaped that history.
James Womack is one of the leading proponents of Lean in the US. He co-authored The Machine That Changed the World and Lean Thinking, two of the most widely read books on the topic of continuous improvement. He also founded the Lean Enterprise Institute and remains (as of 2020) a Read more…
Eli Whitney (December 8, 1765 – January 8, 1825) is most widely known for his invention of the cotton gin. What is more applicable to Lean, though, is his focus on quality, specifically interchangeable parts. The legend goes that he was awarded a contract to make muskets for the fledgling Read more…
John Francis (Jack) Welch (November 19, 1935 – March 1, 2020) was a long-tenured CEO during the heyday of General Electric (GE) from 1981-2001. While in charge of the company, shares rose a massive amount, around 4,000%. His legacy is both revered and hated by different people. He changed the Read more…
Sakichi Toyoda (February 14, 1867 – October 30, 1930) was the founder of Toyoda, though originally, it was not an automobile manufacturer. It was called the Toyoda Loom Works. In addition to being an entrepreneur, Toyoda was an inventor and created an automatic loom that stopped itself when a string Read more…
Kiichiro Toyoda (June 11, 1894 – March 27, 1952) was the son of Sakichi Toyoda, the founder of Toyoda Loom Works. Kiichiro Toyoda was the man responsible for shifting the course of Toyoda from being a textile company to becoming an automobile manufacturer.
Eiji Toyoda (Sept 12, 1913 – September 17, 2013) was, at the time of his tenure, the longest serving president of Toyota. He was the nephew of Sakichi Toyoda, the man who founded Toyoda Loom Works, the predecessor of the automotive version of the company. Eiji Toyoda reportedly visited the Read more…
Frederick Winslow Taylor (March 20, 1856 – March 21, 1915) is most well known for his work on time and motion studies and scientific management. While the facts and data aspect of his work is aligned with modern Lean, his theories of management diverged from Lean in one major way. Read more…
Bill Smith (1929-1993) is the little-known inventor of Six Sigma while working at Motorola. Reportedly, his early version of the problem-solving steps was “MAIC”, or measure, analyze, improve, control, with “Define” added later to make it the current version, “DMAIC”. As a result of Smith’s efforts, Motorola was the first Read more…
John Shook is a Lean author, and currently (as of 2020) the chairman of the Lean Global Network and a senior advisor to the Lean Enterprise Institute. He co-wrote Learning to See, the book that is most responsible for introducing Western manufacturing to value stream mapping. He also has the Read more…
Shigeo Shingo (January 8, 1909 – November 14, 1990) is one of the early pioneers of the Toyota Production System. He worked with Taiichi Ohno, though there is some question as to how instrumental he was in the development of this new way of thinking. The debate ranges from him Read more…
Walter Andrew Shewhart (March 18, 1891 – March 11, 1967) was an engineer, statistician, and physicist. He did a great deal of work in industrial quality with an emphasis on statistical process control. He is perhaps best known for his impact on the PDCA cycle. Deming reportedly adopted it from Read more…
Mike Rother is an author of several books, two of which are associated with the LEI (Lean Enterprise Institute) and received the Shingo Publication Award. Mike is also affiliated with the University of Michigan. His biggest contribution to the Lean community lies in his promotion of the concept of value Read more…