Operational Excellence and Respect

"5S was once 4S, we added sustain to cope with cultural differences surrounding discipline. The 8 wastes were once the 7 wastes, we added the 8th to cope with cultural differences surrounding respect for humanity. These are both excellent examples of how we often detract from wisdom by adding to it. Thinking we can improve things we don't yet understand has led people down the wrong path for time immemorial. Early in this book, Levent Turk grabs this error in thinking and nails it to the wall with this line; Human potential is not something we need to unleash, but rather, something we frequently block... the rest of the book just gets better from that point forward. The author's firsthand training in Toyota, Japan, senior leadership positions in Toyota over 15 years, and 12 years' experience implementing TPS into non-Toyota production environments provides this book with solid foundations. If this were the book we'd inherited in the 90s, maybe we would now be surrounded by leaders who realise a high-performance culture is more to do with their own beliefs in what good looks like and the conditions they create for human brains to survive in ... and not about training tools and tracking KPIs. What others take a whole book to say, Levent Turk captures in a single paragraph or sentence. This is a book of a 1000 books. If you are in a leadership position and want to create a high-performance culture, do yourself a favour. Hang onto every word, ponder every page, digest, understand, reflect. You will not find a better way to spend your time." David Bovis