KaiNexus: Continuous Improvement, Leadership, and More

KaiNexus webinar by Greg Jacobson and Mark Graban: Taking Improvement Boards Digital: How Leading Companies are Improving Visual Management

We get the chance to chat with a lot of frontline employees, managers, and executive leaders about all aspects of continuous improvement. We love to learn about how organizations are using the techniques and tools of Lean and other methodologies to improve results and reach their most important business goals. Gemba Walks are a practice that comes up quite a bit. Some leaders find them to be incre...

Last month, our friends Tania Lyon and David Yeager presented at the Carnegie Foundation Summit on Lean in Education on their research and experience in spreading a culture of continuous improvement. Tania Lyon has been a KaiNexus customer for the last couple of years, and has led her team to accomplish some astounding results in her position as Director of Organizational Process Improvement. Davi...

In this podcast, Mark Graban and Dr. Greg Jacobson chat about their upcoming webinar on May 16 -- learn more at http://kainexus.com/webinars Taking Improvement Boards Digital: How Leading Companies are Improving Visual Management In this webinar you will learn: Why people use improvement boards Challenges to using physical boards How digital boards solve these challenges Examples of effective digi...

A popular ice breaker in business meetings these days is 3 Truths and 1 Lie. Each person says three true things about themselves and one made up thing and everyone tries to guess which is the lie. We thought that 10 truths and 1 lie would be a good way to introduce Standard Work. Can you guess which is which?

If you are a regular reader of this blog, you are probably aware by now that we produce a lot of educational material about continuous improvement methodologies, leadership, engagement strategies, and how to spread an improvement culture. Today we will look at an excerpt from our latest eBook, An Introduction to Continuous Improvement Software.

We expect that the best organizations are continuously improving. We hope they are using Lean, Six Sigma, Kaizen, and other methodologies to engage everybody in continually reinventing and improving what they do and how they do it.

The practice of Kaizen along with the Six Sigma and Lean business process methodologies has been wide spread in manufacturing for decades. More recently other sectors have realized that the practices and principles of Kaizen can accelerate improvement in almost any organization. Like manufacturers, leaders in every industry from construction to higher education are leveraging Kaizen software to su...

We have noticed a theme to many of the conversations that we’ve been having with clients and at the events we have attended lately. Lots of folks have questions about the concept of Continuous Quality Improvement or CQI for short. We have put together some answers to the questions we are asked most often and even a few that people do not ask, but they really should.

We are not saying that your CEO needs shave his or her head, but depending on your improvement goals (and your CEOs attachment to their locks) it might be a great idea! To explain, back in 2016 KaiNexus set a Big Hairy Audacious Goal, known as a BHAG. A BHAG is a daunting, clear, and compelling goal an organization sets, which should not be financially driven, but it should be something that if th...

Donald J. Wheeler, PhD is a world-renown expert in continuous improvement, having worked with W. Edwards Deming and later writing the classic book Understanding Variation. Wheeler once wrote and said, Statistical Process Control is, at its heart, about getting the most from your processes. It is about the continual improvement of processes and outcomes. And it is, first and foremost, a way of thin...

I was at a neighborhood gathering the other day when I ran into an old friend who I had not seen in years. She asked me what I had been up to, so I told her a bit about my role at KaiNexus and mentioned that we have software that helps companies achieve success with business methodologies like Lean and Six Sigma. She said that she figured they just used spreadsheets and email.

Standard work is a term that practitioners of a continuous improvement methodology such as Lean, Kaizen or Six Sigma have probably heard before. It is simply a detailed written description of the most efficient and effective way known to complete a particular process or task, safely, with the highest quality result.

Webinar presented by Kevin Meyer, hosted by Mark Graban. In this webinar you will learn: The fascinating overlap between Lean and Zen. How to use that overlap to calm everyday chaos. How to become more productive by identifying and optimizing the best part of your day. How to grow as a person - and a leader. About the Host: Kevin Meyer is a co-founder and partner at Gemba Academy. He has over 30 y...

During a Gemba walk, supervisors and leaders go to the place where work is done (the Gemba). They observe (not fix) processes and activities and ask questions that will help lead to future improvements. Why? - is certainly an important question, but it is by no means the only one. We have put together a list of other questions that may be useful, especially if you are new to Gemba walks or if you...

Kevin Meyer from Gemba Academy, author of the book "The Simple Leader" will be giving a webinar for KaiNexus on April 25. Register at http://www.kainexus.com/webinars The title is "Personal Leadership at the Nexus of Lean and Zen." We hope you can join us or check out the recording.

"How KaiNexus Uses Kaizen and our KaiNexus Software to Improve: Podcast Episode Numbers" A blog post by Mark Graban

Keep doing what you are doing and you are going to get what you are getting. Few would argue that the logic rings true, but unfortunately, this idea is often ignored when it comes to strategic business planning. Executives huddle in a room, analyze budgets, set revenue goals, and predict great success without fundamentally changing the conditions that led to the business results they are experienc...

The DMAIC technique is simple, yet powerful. It brings structure to the improvement process and helps teams explore potential solutions, decide a course of action, and implement process controls in short order. Trying any new improvement strategy can be intimidating, so we thought it would be helpful to break down all the details of DMAIC so that you can give it a try with confidence.

In our first KaiNexus "customer spotlight," Mark Graban talks with Ben Whitaker, Director, Business Process Management at Mohawk Fine Papers. We talk about their use of KaiNexus, how they are changing the culture, and more.

KaiNexus has a webinar series called Ask Us Anything, in which our CEO and Co-founder Greg Jacobson and Mark Graban, our Vice-President of Improvement & Innovation Services and founder of LeanBlog.org, join forces to answer questions KaiNexus webinar listeners ask. In this post, we will look at two questions and answers from a recent webinar.

I have been debating with myself over whether to use the word conceptions or misconceptions in this post. I decided to go with conceptions because I do not know whether these frequently held beliefs are accurate or not within your organization. We do know from countless conversations with our customers that they are devastating to a culture of improvement whether they are true or not. Here is how...

Any good continuous improvement platform empowers you to improve in any way you see fit, rather than forcing you to subscribe to one particular methodology. That means people use the software to support a ton of different types of improvement work - including improvement-related certification classes.

If you’re using the Six Sigma methodology to create change and sustain continuous improvement in your organization, you’re likely using, or will use, DMAIC (pronounced "de-may-ick"). DMAIC is an acronym that outlines a framework for identifying and challenging sources of waste, poor quality, and inefficient processes and then looking for opportunities for improvement. DMAIC is best used when an ex...

Mark Graban and Dr. Greg Jacobson address your questions on: - Getting front line staff to embrace Kaizen and continuous improvement as a win/win - Getting leaders and executives to buy in to continuous improvement - What's your process for planning a kaizen event?