Lean
To get a handle on why this is so and what can be done about it, we spoke to Jim Manley, who brings the perspective of one whose first exposure to lean was decades ago in, unsurprisingly, the automotive in- dustry, and who still works to put lean into the DNA of companies and organizations in his home state of Michigan. In a wide- ranging discussion in late September, he offered some insights as to what lean can be—and what it isn’t.
From Michigan to 29 Countries—and Back Jim Manley began his career on the assembly line at General Motors at age
Michigan Lean Consortium Chair Jim Manley
19, “welding cars together at Willow Run.” While at GM, he learned about systems thinking from Dr. W. Edwards Deming (see sidebar) and the Toyota Production System from Toyota masters at NUMMI, the GM/Toyota joint venture based in
Fremont, CA. At Delphi, the GM-spinoff auto parts supplier, he coached teams in 29 coun- tries as they implemented lean into their plant operating systems. In 2005, Manley received the Delphi Corporate Lifetime Lean Achieve- ment Award. He finished his corporate career as the North American Supply Chain Director for auto parts supplier Faurecia. But Manley has had a post-retirement mission: to bring lean thinking to busi- nesses and organizations in his home state of Michigan—and not only to those connected to the car-making business. His campaign has two organizations behind it. In 2012 he accepted the position of managing director for
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the Demmer Center for Business Transformation at Michi- gan State University’s Eli Broad College of Business. Under Manley’s leadership, Demmer Center de-emphasizes aca- demic research in favor of hands-on work with companies and organizations as the business equivalent of the university’s extension service to farmers and growers. That same year—2012—Manley joined the nonprofit, all-volunteer Michigan Lean Consortium (MLC) and, to his sur- prise, found himself kicked upstairs to its board of directors and then, in a matter of months, becoming its chair. He took the chairmanship under the condition that the organization restructure and poise itself for more influence and growth. Now MLC’s stated mission is to “develop and support lean systems thinkers to transform Michigan’s organizations and economy.” The organization has worked with scores of companies and individuals through conferences, coaching, apprenticeships and seminars, all designed to instill real lean thinking into their DNA.
Manley considers this work to be a responsibility entrusted to him as a second-generation lean practitioner. “The first generation was Toyota. The second generation is me, and people like me,” Manley said. “Toyota came to the US and started NUMMI, the joint venture with GM, and started exposing American automobile manufacturers to lean thinking. I learned lean from masters—from Dr. Deming and the Toyota guys. But that experience was limited to the auto industry. So now my message to my students and to the mem- bers of MLC is ‘you guys are the third generation of lean.’ And with them, we’re now taking lean out of the auto industry and into the wider world.”
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ManufacturingEngineeringMedia.com | November 2014
Photo courtesy Michigan State University
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