Conversations with Taiichi Ohno: Management Insights for the Digital Age

By Bob Emiliani

Conversations with Taiichi Ohno: Management Insights for the Digital Age is a fictional five-day dialogue in which the author imagines discussing the deeper workings of the Toyota Production System (TPS) with its creator. The book seeks to solve two persistent problems: managers struggle to truly understand TPS, and, misreading it as a 20th-century factory method, they dismiss it as irrelevant to the digital age. Through Ohno's imagined voice, the book recovers the way of thinking behind TPS and shows why it matters more than ever.

This book helps readers by:

Recovering the Unique Mindset Behind the Tools. Day One returns to the fundamentals - sellers' vs. buyers' markets, kaizen, speed of improvement, cost reduction, and respect for humanity - so readers grasp why TPS works, not just its mechanics. Correcting Common Misreadings of TPS. Day Two tackles the subtleties lost in translation - learning from nature, leading TPS, the illusion of knowledge, and developing people - dismantling the false confidence that keeps managers from real understanding. Removing the Excuses that Block Progress. Day Three confronts the rationalizations managers use, and clarifies growing sales, the senseless pursuit of scale, and flow production, so people stop hiding behind reasons not to change. Turning Understanding into Sustained Practice. Day Four addresses training and practice, stagnation vs. evolution, school vs. work, and turning words into action, pushing readers past passive reading toward disciplined, ongoing effort. Positioning TPS for the Digital Age. Day Five confronts the claim that TPS is obsolete, examining automation, digital transformation, and artificial intelligence, and argues that humans must never be controlled by computers or numbers.

Written as an educational workbook with reflective exercises rather than a lecture, this book is aimed at managers and practitioners willing to challenge their preconceptions and think for themselves. For readers who suspect that the many simplified interpretations of Lean have drifted far from the original, it offers a way back to the human-centered thinking that is at the heart of TPS and makes the case that those ideas and practices are built for this century too.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0989863182
• ISBN13: 9780989863186
• Release Date: June 2017
• Publisher: Center for Lean Business Management, LLC
• Length: 212 Pages
• Weight: 0.60 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.5" x 5.5" x 8.5"