Lean Blog Interviews: Real-World Lean Leadership Conversations in Healthcare and Beyond

Joining me again for Episode #298 is Billy R. Taylor, for Part 2 of a discussion we started in Episode #293. Last week, a friend texted me last week and said he couldn't wait for Part 2. He said he pulled off the road to take some notes when he listened to Part 1. So without further ado, here is Part 2. Here, we discuss "extreme ownership," why creating ownership is more important than forcing accountability, and important lessons he's learned along the way.

My guest for Episode #297 is John (JJ) Villarreal, Ed.D., the superintendent of the Rockwall I.S.D. here in the Dallas area. In this podcast, we talk about the applications of Lean in education, how to move beyond what JJ calls "the behavior waste of judgment and blame," and how visiting a factory was inspiring and helpful, among other topics. Even if you don't work in education, I hope you'll be inspired by this podcast.

Joining me for Episode #296 of the podcast is Zeev N. Kain, MD. MBA, FAAP. He is a physician and a Chancellor's Professor at the University of California, Irvine. See his full bio. He has many additional roles and titles, including: Director, System Redesign & Value Based Care for the UC-Irvine Health Policy Research Institute Executive Director of the UCI-Yale Center on Stress & Health President of the American College of Perioperative Medicine Dr. Kain is "recognized as an international expert in the clinical management of perioperative fear and anxiety, and management of children undergoing invasive medical procedures. His research addresses major dilemmas encountered in the management of affected children." He's also an advocate for Lean and Six Sigma and the connections to reducing "clinical variation" in healthcare. So, that's what we're talking about today.

My guests for Episode #295 are Sarah Steinberg of Atrius Health and Ted Toussaint, a healthcare innovation strategist, formerly of Atrius Health. Ted is also a faculty member for Catalysis.  Today, we're talking about some innovative work that they led at Atrius, using a variety of modern product development and innovation methods, including Lean, Lean Startup, Design Thinking, and more to create a new "Care in Place" model for home-based patient care that helps reduce trips to a clinic or hospital. Their work was featured in this HBR article: "How Atrius Health Is Making the Shift from Volume to Value."

Joining me for episode #294 is Clay Linkous, an account leader and speaker with Studer Group. He is an accomplished cultural transformation and leadership expert who has synthesized Lean and other improvement methods with Studer Group principles and practices. Today, we'll talk about Clay's career and his purpose and motivations - both for working in healthcare and improving healthcare. We're both firm believers in the combination of Studer and Lean practices, so we're also discussing that as our main topic. I hope you enjoy the discussion!

My guest for Episode #293 of the podcast is a dynamic speaker and manufacturing leader, Billy R. Taylor. I saw him speak a few years ago at a Shingo Prize Conference and I've wanted to get him on the podcast ever since. He's currently the Director of Commercial, Off Highway, and Support Manufacturing North America for The Goodyear Tire & Rubber Company. Over the past 20 years, he has risen from "the lowest level of the organization," up through the manufacturing leadership ranks at Goodyear, including time as a Plant Director at facilities in Oklahoma and North Carolina. He's been "engaged in Lean" for over 15 years and he is a Six Sigma Master Black Belt. Billy has a BS in in Electrical Engineering from Prairie View A&M University and an MBA from Baker University. Billy was very giving of his time and we talked for over 75 minutes, so I'm breaking this up into two parts, with Part 2 coming soon. Today, we talk about how he got started with Lean, the shift from tools- and event-based Lean to a culture focus, how to build a sense of ownership, servant leadership, strategy deployment, employee recognition and more.

Today, our topic is something that I've really taken an interest in the past two years: "Motivational Interviewing." See my past blog posts on this subject. I think it's a powerful methodology that will help anybody in their Lean transformation efforts... as well as our work engaging anybody in a small improvement. "Motivational Interviewing" or M.I. is defined by Miller and Rollnick (in their seminal book) as a "collaborative conversation for strengthening a person's own motivation and commitment to change." My guests for Episode 292 are the three co-authors of an excellent book, Motivational Interviewing for Leadership: MI-LEAD. They are (pictured from left to right in this order): Jason Wilcox, Director of Education and Connected Care at VA Roseburg Dr. Brian Kersh, Clinical Psychologist at New Mexico VA Health System Dr. Elizabeth Jenkins, Clinical Psychologist/Courtesy Assistant Professor at University of South Florida

My guest for Episode 291 is my friend and colleague, Jeff Roussel (@jeff_roussel on Twitter). Jeff is the VP of Sales at KaiNexus, a technology company that I have been involved with for over six years. As Jeff will humbly explain in the podcast, he joined our team almost four years ago as an experienced sales leader, not as an expert in Lean or process improvement. But, he's a voracious learner and he probably talks to more organizations about their process improvement efforts - what their aims are and what they're struggling with - than anybody I know. Our main theme for the podcast today is not technology. Our topics include what Jeff is hearing from organizations and trends he hears about. I hope you'll enjoy our conversation, as I did. I hope you'll also join us on Thursday as Jeff presents a free webinar hosted by me and KaiNexus: The Why, How and What of Continuous Improvement

@EricRies: From #LeanStartup to "The Startup Way" Joining me again for episode 290 is a three-time guest, Eric Ries. When we first talked, in episode 115 six years ago, his New York Times bestselling book The Lean Startup was being published. In 2012, we discussed the impact of Toyota's Taiichi Ohno on his work, in episode 142. This time, we're talking about his new book, The Startup Way. In this episode, Eric talks about how "Lean Startup" concepts came from "Lean" and the Toyota Production System and how Toyota then approached him about applying Lean Startup concepts in the development of a new in-dash electronics system. In recent years, GE and other large companies, in their efforts to be more innovative and entrepreneurial, have adapted these approaches into what Eric calls "The Startup Way." Will modern companies embrace a formal "entrepreneurship" function as they earlier embraced finance and marketing? We'll discuss that and more. Below, you'll find the full audio podcast, a 7-page PDF summary, and a complete transcript. The Startup Way is set for release tomorrow, October 17. Learn more at www.TheStartupWay.co. I had a chance to read the book in advance and enjoyed it very much. I hope you'll also join me at Lean Startup Week, where I'll be a speaker and session facilitator.

Episode page Audio remastered January 2023 My guests for Episode #289 are Kathleen Sharp, MBOE, LSS MBB, now the Director of Optimization at McLeod Health, and David Schoenwetter, D.O., FACEP, a Medical Director at Geisinger Medical Center. They are joining me to talk about the innovative Geisinger Mobile Health Paramedic program that they developed and piloted with Lean thinking throughout. Kathleen and David will discuss why it was important to engage stakeholders in innovation, how they viewed and addressed resistance to change, why it was important to test the idea in practice, and why it was important to measure results. They also discuss their lessons learned and their challenges along the way. This WSJ article has a nice summary of the program: "Paramedics Aren't Just for Emergencies." "In the Geisinger pilot program, mobile health visits can be requested by a patient's primary-care doctor, a cardiology clinic, or after an emergency room or hospital discharge. Patients who frequently visit the ER are offered the option of being seen at home by a paramedic as an alternative to an ER visit and potential hospital admission, especially for conditions that can be treated at home if caught early." I hope you enjoy the episode.