Call it kaizen or continuous improvement or whatever term you prefer. In the end if you don't deliver results you won't be in business for long. The two pillars of the Toyota system are respect for people and continuous improvement for this reason. Processes, equipment, tools, or assets don't improve on their own. It takes the structured work of teams to drive and sustain impro...

Part of improvement is indeed related to how you think and interact with others in order to obtain better results. However most organizations struggle to develop this mindset and behaviors in leaders or employees. One of our ten leadership shaping principles in fact is called "thinking patterns".  This involves how you personally think, make decisions, act, and communicate with...

The number one area most organizations struggle with is leadership development. Toyota was lucky to have highly skilled leaders such as Eiji Toyoda, Taiichi Ohno, Fujio Cho, and too many others to name here. These great improvement leaders however were not born with their skill sets. Instead they developed them carefully over time with great practice, effort, and self awareness...