Dr. Richard Zarbo, Senior Vice President and Chair, Pathology and Laboratory Medicine at Henry Ford Health SystemSo many people have taught us and generously shared with us, it is difficult to know where to start—and end—in thanking you all. Karyn and Jeff chose to write separate acknowledgements.
Unfortunately, I cannot acknowledge everyone who graciously agreed to lengthy interviews and reviewed parts of this book for accuracy. But several put an exceptional amount of time into sharing their stories, information, and then editing for accuracy. You will see there are many detailed case examples in this book. Thank you all for teaching me what the pursuit of service excellence means, not just in theory, but in the hearts of real people. Special thanks (in no particular order) to:
Dr. Richard Zarbo, Senior Vice President and Chair, Pathology and Laboratory Medicine at Henry Ford Health System
Betty Gratopp, Production General Manager, Zingerman’s Mail Order
Tom Root, Owner and Managing Partner, Zingerman’s Mail Order
Richard Sheridan, Chief Storyteller, Menlo Innovations, and author of Joy, Inc.
John Taylor, General Manager and Vice President, Dunning Toyota and Dunning Subaru
Einar Gudmundsson, CEO at Rejmes Bil (Volvo Dealer)
Veli-Matti Mattila, CEO, Elisa
Petri Selkäinaho, Development Director, Elisa
Merja Ranta-aho, Executive VP, Human Resources, Elisa
David Hanna, Partner, HPO Global Alliance, and author of The Organizational Survival Code
Kai Laamanen, Management Consulting Professional at Innotiimi
Jonathan Escobar Marin, Global Head of Lean Management, Hartmann Group
Mariano Jimenez Torres, Organizational Development Manager, Inversiones La Paz
Florencio Munoz, Senior Lean Consultant
Brock Husby, PhD (my former doctoral student), lean healthcare consultant
Eduardo Lander, PhD (my former doctoral student), lean services consultant
Hiroshi Ozawa, Professor, Nagoya University (research collaborator)
John Shook, CEO, Lean Enterprise Institute (one of my first and most influential teachers)
Pierre Nadeau, Proprietor of SoulSmithing (was Swordsmith apprentice in Japan)
Whitney Walters, Director, Lean for Clinical Redesign, University of Michigan
Bill Costantino, Senior Partner, W3 Group
Tyson Ortiz, Parent who saved his son Michael’s life following improvement kata principles
I continue to learn and be inspired by every visit I make to Toyota, inside and outside of Japan. Mitsuru Kawai, a student of Ohno, was particularly inspiring in his unwavering dedication to developing people day by day through challenge and mentoring. I was also inspired by Latondra Newton, group vice president of Toyota North America, who took responsibility for turning On-the-Job Development as a concept in Toyota into a deliberate coaching and teaching approach.
In this book we define service excellence as a journey of scientific thinking toward a clear vision. By this we mean experimenting and reflecting to overcome obstacles toward a goal. We owe these key insights that run through the book to my former student Mike Rother who wrote Toyota Kata. A kata is a practice routine, breaking down a complex skill, in this case a scientific approach to improvement, to basic elements that can be practiced with a coach. Mike has developed a way of understanding this, drawing on brain science research, and a practical way to change our mindsets to think and act scientifically. We are very grateful to Mike for these deep insights and his personal coaching of Jeff in coffee shops around Ann Arbor.
Three times I have taught the ideas in this book in my graduate seminar at the University of Michigan. My students do lean projects in local organization using the framework of the improvement kata and coaching kata, mostly in service organizations. I have learned so much from their creativity and enthusiasm. The Dunning Toyota case in this book was based on a project by Xinhang Li, Mengyuan Sun, Ruqing Ye, and Zhenhuan Yu.
I asked Karyn Ross to partner with me because she is a skilled and experienced coach of service organizations dutifully (and joyfully) following the Toyota Way principles. To my delight I also got an artist and short story writer in the deal! The book is written in the first person from my perspective, but Karyn has been a true partner.
I am once again grateful to my family for their love and support throughout this very consuming writing process. I get much of my inspiration and ideas from Deb, Em, and Jesse. In this book Deb did detailed editing which all our readers will appreciate.
I’d like to thank my husband, Brian Hoffert, and children Quinton Hoffert and Serena Ross for their support over many years as I’ve learned and practiced the Toyota Way. Whether through practice on home processes such as laundry, or outside, in countless conversations with service workers in restaurants, stores, hotels, etc., they’ve learned along with me and have become quite proficient practitioners themselves. My husband recently texted me from a line in an airport restaurant about flow problems and possible countermeasures.
As you will learn in this book, without teachers to coach and guide us, self-development and progress is nearly impossible.
Special thanks to my teachers and mentors. For the real Leslie Henckler, my first lean mentor and teacher, thank you for giving me an unbelievably strong foundation (go to gemba and see for yourself—stop making so many assumptions!), for teaching me that the only answer ever is “it depends” and most importantly for teaching me to “learn by doing” so that I could learn how to think and to teach others. Thank you to my friend and colleague, Dennis Gawlik, a real “kata geek,” for constantly pushing, questioning and challenging me (“What’s your hypothesis?”) so that I don’t stay comfortable for too long. I’ve become a better coach both by watching you coach others and being coached by you!
Thank you also to the many people I have had the joy and privilege of working with in service organizations large and small as they learn and grow and find ways to use the concepts and practices in this book to satisfy the real, live customers that they serve every day. In this regard, I owe a special thanks to the partners at National Taxi Limo. Your passion, commitment, and dedication to learning continues to inspire me and teach me. Thanks for your great story that became the centerpiece of our final chapter.
And for Jeff Liker, thank you for being the consummate teacher and mentor, willing to spend countless hours listening and responding to my questions, creating opportunities for me to learn (including this book), and for constantly challenging and pushing me out of my comfort zone. Thank you for being an unbelievable role model who constantly inspires me (and countless others) to continuously work to develop my thinking and practice, as you continuously work to develop yours. Unbelievable gifts for all of us!