Creating a Lean Culture: Tools to Sustain Lean Conversions, Third Edition

Winner of a Shingo Research and Professional Publication Award

The new edition of this Shingo Prize-winning bestseller provides critical insights and approaches to make any Lean transformation an ongoing success. It shows you how to implement a sustainable, successful transformation by developing a culture that has your stakeholders throughout the organizational chart involved and invested in the outcome. It teaches you how to successfully navigate the politics in cross-functional process improvement projects, and to engage executives in ways that are personally meaningful to them. If you are a leader at any level in an organization undergoing or considering a Lean transformation, this is where you should start and finish … and start again.

Read the Reviews:

"This book became an instant classic in the literature of professional operations. In this third edition, David Mann updates and expands his teaching with five additional years of valuable experience and expertise derived from his very active, multi-industry consultancy. I have benefitted greatly from his writing and wholeheartedly recommend this book to be top-of-the desk of any serious Lean practitioner or performance transformation leader."
— Raymond C. Floyd, two-time Shingo Prize Winner, President and CEO, Plasco Energy Group

"David Mann builds substantially on his seminal work on the Lean management system. The book is full of new insight and polishes the most important ideas about Lean management. The new chapter on engaging executive leadership alone is worth the price of the book."
— Peter Ward, Richard M. Ross Professor and Chair, Department of Management Science, Fisher College of Business, The Ohio State University

"This book has long been my ‘go-to’ guide on Lean management practices that help create a culture of continuous improvement and excellence. I have recommended the book to countless healthcare leaders who rave about how helpful it is in translating Lean principles into daily management behaviors. The healthcare examples make it even more relevant as a must read for any hospital leader who aims to move beyond Lean tools.."
—Mark Graban, author of Lean Hospitals, co-author of Healthcare Kaizen and The Executive Guide to Healthcare Kaizen

"As more companies outside the manufacturing sector pursue Lean transformations, Creating a Lean Culture is as critical a resource as ever. Breaking down silos and navigating tricky internecine politics remain a momentous challenge, and Mann’s case-based insights are an invaluable tool."
— Peg Pennington, Executive Director, Center for Operational Excellence, Fisher College of Business, The Ohio State University

"David has once again taken the topics that trip us up and put structure and guidance around them. His new work on executive involvement is worth the price of the book all by itself. Many of us have struggled with this topic and David provides a path to success."
— Elizabeth M. King, Vice President Organizational Effectiveness, ESCO Corporation

New in the Third Edition:

• Contains new chapter on engaging executives in Lean initiatives


• Includes 21 new case studies


• Presents new examples from the healthcare and process industries


• Includes additional gemba worksheets for learning and teaching Lean


• Provides expanded coverage of Lean applications in complex cross functional value stream process improvement projects