The Office of Continuous Improvement has a library of Lean resources available for
loan. Below is the list of resources that includes books, DVDs and workshop materials.
These resources cover the basics of Lean, Lean culture building strategies, group
facilitation, and specific Lean tools and concepts.
These resources are available for loan to all faculty, staff and students. Contact us at improvement@mtu.edu to check out a book. Feel free to stop by 136W Wadsworth Hall to take a look at the library in person.
Lean Library Resources Available for Loan
Click on the title to see more information. Some link pages may have purchase information, but remember, all books are available for loan at no charge from the Office of Continuous Improvement!
Indicates the book is available in electronic form (Audible and Kindle)
5S for Operators: 5 Pillars of the Visual Workplace
Hiroyuki Hirano's five pillars of the visual workplace: sort, set in order, shine,
standardize, and sustain are the most fundamental and often overlooked aspects in
continuous improvement initiatives. Together, these concepts form the framework of
the 5S system.
Andy and Me: Crisis and Transformation on the Lean Journey
A business novel set in a failing New Jersey auto plant focusing on the tribulations
of Tom Pappas, the plant manager of a struggling production plant. The reader learns
that Toyota Production System is more than just a collection of tools; it entails
a new way of thinking and behaving. Though Tom finds success — both in his plant and
in his personal life — he learns from Andy that successful improvement is "endless
and eternal." --Elizabeth Wohlford
A Factory of One: Applying Lean Principles to Banish Waste and Improve Your Personal Performance
A More Beautiful Question (Electronic Version Only)
Better Building: Lean Practice for the Project-Driven Organization
Beyond Change Management: Advanced Strategies for Today's Transformational Leaders
About the interaction of leadership style, mindset, and the change process-revolutionizes
leaders' approach to transformational change. You'll also get: ready-to-use worksheets,
questionnaires, and guidelines. --Elizabeth Wohlford
Beyond the Lean Office: A Novel on Progressing from Lean Tools to Operational Excellence
Breaking Through to Flow: banish fire fighting and increase customer service
Business Officer Magazine
February 2013 edition with Dining Services article
The Change Agents' Handbook: A Survival Guide for Quality Improvement Champions
A quick reference for leaders / facilitators in quality improvement and lean methods.
--Elizabeth Wohlford
The Checklist Manifesto: How to Get Things Right
The author takes the reader from Austria, where an emergency checklist saved a drowning
victim who had spent half an hour underwater, to Michigan, where a cleanliness checklist
in intensive care units virtually eliminated a type of deadly hospital infection.
Explaining how checklists actually work to prompt striking and immediate improvements.
The checklist revolution flows into fields well beyond medicine, from disaster response
to investment banking, skyscraper construction, and businesses of all kinds. --Elizabeth
Wohlford
The Coaching Habit: Say Less, Ask More, and Change the Way You Lead Forever
The Complete Lean Enterprise: Value Stream Mapping for Administrative and Office Processes
This book offers a step-by-step approach to applying lean initiatives to the administrative
and office environment. It's a must read for leaders looking to improve their production
support activities within their order-to-cash value stream. --Elizabeth Wohlford
The Consultant's Tool Kit
Written and field-tested by practicing consultants, The Consultant’s Tool Kit will
save consultants both time and money-as it makes their work with clients much more
effective. Each tool or activity is designed to solve a common consulting problem.
--Elizabeth Wohlford
Creating a Lean Culture
It shows you how to implement a transformation that cannot fail by developing a culture
that will have all your stakeholders involved in the process and invested in the outcome.
It will teach you how to build success from the top down and the bottom up at the
same time. --Elizabeth Wohlford
Creating Continuous Flow: an action guide for managers, engineers & production associates
Critical Chain
"Critical Chain," a gripping fast-paced business novel, does for Project Management
what Eli Goldratt's other novels have done for Production and Marketing. --Elizabeth
Wohlford
Critical Thinking: Concepts and Tools
This miniature guide focuses on the essence of critical thinking concepts and tools.
It provides a shared concept of critical thinking to improve learning in any content
area.
The Deming Dimension
The book begins with a first-rate historical perspective and then goes on to explain
the basic tenets of the Deming philosophy, including such topics as The Fourteen Points,
The Deadly Diseases, The Obstacles, and the System of Profound Knowledge (updated
shortly before Deming's death in 1993). --Elizabeth Wohlford
Deming's Profound Changes: When Will the Sleeping Giant Awaken?
Shows organization and technical managers how to change—using Deming's principles—in
order to improve quality in delivered services and products and in employee satisfaction.
Analyzes the flaws of Taylorism and Neo-Taylorism— with point-by-point comparison
with Deming's philosophy. For Executive and Technical Managers (all industries); Quality
Managers and Practitioners; Quality, Productivity, Organizational Development Consultants.
--Elizabeth Wohlford
Designing the Future (Electronic Version Only)
Developing Lean Leaders at All Levels: A Practical Guide (Electronic Version Only)
Dr. Deming: The American Who Taught the Japanese About Quality
Explains and showcases the Deming Management Method which is defined by traits such
as how: quality leads to lower costs, most defects are caused by the system, buy from
vendors committed to quality, fear leads to disaster, and how to work with suppliers.
--Elizabeth Wohlford
The Difference: When Good Enough Isn't Enough
Drive: The Surprising Truth about What Motivates Us
The secret to high performance and satisfaction - at work, at school, and at home
- is the deeply human need to direct our own lives, to learn and create new things,
and to do better by ourselves and our world. This book examines three elements of
true motivation and offers smart and surprising techniques for putting these into
action.
Easier, Simpler, Faster. Systems Strategy for Lean IT
Empowerment Takes More Than a Minute
Explains that empowerment is not "giving power to people." Rather, it is "releasing
the knowledge, experience, and motivation they already have." --Elizabeth Wohlford
Educational Lean for Higher Education: Theory and Practice
The Energy to Lead: The Thermodynamics of Leadership
Explains and gives great examples of how the basic laws of thermodynamics parallel
good leadership behaviors.
Everything I Know About Lean I Learned in First Grade
A simple explanation of Lean principles and definitions told as a story about the
author’s visit to school on his daughter’s first day in first grade. The author is
very enthusiastic and uses everyday examples and analogies for every point, so this
is an easy read. I recommend this book to people who have no background in Lean. --Ruth
Archer
A Factory of One: Applying Lean Principles to Banish Waste and Improve Your Personal
Performance
This book not only provides the tools, but also teaches you how to find the root causes
underlying your inefficiencies so you can eliminate them permanently. It will enable
you to immediately improve personal productivity while developing the skills needed
for continuous improvement. --Elizabeth Wohlford
Feeding the Zircon Gorilla and other team building activities
Four Days with Dr. Deming: A Strategy for Modern Methods of Management
Dr. W. Edwards Deming, the legendary master of managing for quality whose techniques
helped propel Japan into its postwar economic boom, delivered his management message
in the form of four-day seminars. Now you can experience the wisdom of his seminars
with this unique book. --Elizabeth Wohlford
Getting the Right Things Done: A Leader's Guide to Planning and ExecutionDemonstrates how strategy deployment can help leaders harness the full power of Lean. --Elizabeth Wohlford
Getting to "Yes and" : The Art of Business Improv
Getting to Lean: Transformational Change Management
This book is important for any organization that wishes to create a new status quo
in all aspects of the organization. Miller talks about the Whole-System which includes
every aspect of the operation of the business: internal assets and liabilities, external
customers, social systems and identifying the value stream. The ideas in this book
are targeted to the organization that wants (or needs) a complete makeover from top
to bottom, as opposed to using select Lean tools for targeted improvements. A detailed
discussion is provided on the phases of change from Discovery to Dreaming to Designing
the new organization. A very challenging and inspiring book. --Mary FogelsingerHuss
The Goal: A Process of Ongoing Improvement (Electronic Version Only)
The Gold Mine: A Novel of Lean Turnaround
Group Facilitation Methods
This is a book from a workshop by The Institute of Cultural Affairs
The Hitchhiker's Guide to Lean
Reveals the most critical lessons learned over the authors' combined 30-plus years
of exploring the lean highways. The book's 10 chapters cover lean principles and thinking,
lean leadership moves, the roadmap for lean transformation, common pitfalls of lean
journeys, building an operating system, lean accounting, lean material management,
lean in service organizations, and how individuals can apply lean to improve themselves.
--Elizabeth Wohlford
How to De-Junk Your Life: Keys to Taking Control, Getting Organized and Getting It
All Done
Author uses about 70 pages to make his point with each chapter focusing on a specific
aspect. You will learn a major key point: J.A.K.E. = Junk Always Kills Effectiveness.
--Elizabeth Wohlford
How to Succeed with Continuous Improvement
The Human Side of Change: A Practical Guide to Organization Redesign
The IAF Handbook of Group Facilitation
The Ice Cream Maker: An Inspiring Tale About Making Quality the Key Ingredient in
Everything You Do
The author uses a story about an ice cream manufacturer's struggle to survive as a
tool to talk about quality. The plant manager of the ice cream company has been told
his factory will be closed if he can't increase its profitability. He reaches out
to an old friend who is a manager at Natural Foods, to find out why they won't stock
his ice cream. The friend takes him on a quality journey involving listening, enriching,
and optimizing. This book is an excellent, short, and very readable story that helps
you see how all the pieces of a quality program fit together. --Ruth Archer
The Idea Generator: Quick and Easy Kaizen
The Innovator's Toolkit
Written and presented in an easy-to-use reference format, the book helps users understand
why, when, and how to apply each technique for maximum benefits and results. --Elizabeth
Wohlford
Integrating Kanban with MRPII
If you manage inventory, you probably use MRPII, a system based on a push method that
embraces work and purchase order execution. MRPII helps you plan and integrate data
relevant to your entire organization. But, when you have shifts in demand, you have
to: 1) Realign and cancel hundreds of open manufacturing and purchase orders, and
then 2) issue new orders. --ElizabethWohlford
It's Our Ship: The No-Nonsense Guide to Leadership
(Book on CD)
The Kaizen Event Planner: Achieving Rapid Improvement in Office, Service, and Technical Environments
Kaizen: The Key to Japan's Competitive Success
Leader's Handbook: A Guide to Inspiring Your People and Managing the Daily Workflow, The
Leading Change: An Action Plan From the World's Foremost Expert on Business Leadership
Leading the Lean Enterprise Transformation
Leading with Questions: How Leaders Find the Right Solutions
Lean Accounting Guidebook: How to Create a World-Class Accounting Department, The
Lean Construction: A Small Contractor's Journey
Lean Construction: One Company's Journey to Success
The Lean Enterprise Memory Jogger
Lean for Dummies
Lean for Dummies is an excellent resource that gives the reader not only a deep dive
into everything Lean, but also a great quick reference for specific topics. The book
was written so that every chapter has a specific topic and each chapter can be read
independently of the other chapters as the user finds need. This book was used for
the basis of developing the Student Process Improvement Coordinator training course.
--ElizabethWohlford
The Lean Handbook: A Guide to The Bronze Certification Body of Knowledge
Lean Higher Education: Increasing Value and Performance of University Processes, Second Edition
Lean Human Resources: Redesigning HR Processes for a Culture of Continuous Improvement
Lean IT: Enabling and Sustaining Your Lean Transformation
Lean Labor: A Survival Guide for Companies Facing Global Competition
Lean Office: Demystified
Lean Office Demystified is a great book when you are looking to begin your lean journey,
especially if you are working in an office setting. The book breaks down lean so
it is easy for any reader to understand. It gives you a clear definition of what
lean is and isn't and covers a wide variety of lean tools. The book also has a great
appendix with different audits, visual controls, and activities for the reader to
participate in while reading through the book. I would recommend this book for someone
who is new to lean or someone who wants to brush up on their lean knowledge. --KayleeBetzinger
Lean Office and Service Simplified
The Lean Practitioners Field Book
Lean Production Simplified
Provides a comprehensive insider's view of lean manufacturing. The author helps the
reader grasp the system as a whole and the factors that animate it by organizing the
book around an image of a house of lean production.
Lean Project Delivery: Building Championship Project Teams
Lean Safety: Transforming Your Safety Culture with Lean Management
Lean Solutions: How Companies and Customers Can Create Value and Wealth Together
Lean Thinking: Banish Waste and Create Wealth in Your Corporation
This book is the follow-up to the best seller "The Machine that Changed the World,”
and expands on the fundamental principles of lean operations. In “Lean Thinking” Part
One, the authors expand on the concepts that help the corporations understand and
specify value, order and streamline all the processes that add value in the value
stream, and make value flow. In Part Two, the authors take these principles and teach
you how to apply them by using examples and case histories. In Part Three, the ideas
go beyond the process, to the enterprise, and describe how to work toward connecting
all your value-creating activities from start to finish… whatever your process is. This
book is a good resource for those familiar with Lean principles who are looking to
take their program to the next level. --MaryFogelsinger-Huss
Lean Transformation
This book is a must-read for anyone considering turning their organization into a
lean enterprise. It's a very fast-paced book split into four parts that outline the
strategy behind going Lean, the six fundamentals of a lean enterprise, how to effectively
spread lean throughout an enterprise, and sustaining the lean transformation. The
authors, Bruce Henderson and Jorge Larco, do a great job providing examples of past
successes and failures to illustrate the many dynamics of what makes a lean transformation
successful. The book shows time and time again that anyone who is not willing to
get on the lean bandwagon will get left behind. I would recommend this to anyone
who is in the process of starting up a new business or people who want to make their
business more efficient but don't exactly know how. Regardless of the reader's level
of knowledge about lean, they should find this book extremely insightful. --Nate Hood
Lean: Behavior Based Safety, For Today's Realities
Learning Organizations: Developing Cultures for Tomorrow's Workplace
Learning to See
Value-stream maps are the blueprints for lean transformations and Learning to See
is an easy-to-read, step-by-step instruction manual that teaches this valuable tool
to anyone, regardless of his or her background.
The Machine that Changed the World
Provides enduring and essential guidance to managers and leaders in every industry
seeking to transform traditional enterprises into exemplars of lean success.
Managing at the Speed of Change: How Resilient Managers Succeed and Prosper Where Others Fail
Managing Change: Practical Strategies for Competitive Advantage
Managing The Unknowable: Strategic Boundaries Between Order and Chaos in Organizations
Memory Jogger 2: Tools for Continuous Improvement and Effective Planning
Critical tools are explained using real-life examples from all types of organizations
with problems similar to yours, making them easy for everyone to understand and apply.
The Miniature Guide to Critical Thinking - Concepts & Tools
The New Lean Pocket Guide XL: Tools for the Elimination of Waste!
Open Book Management: The Coming Business Revolution
Organize Your Office: Simple Routines for Managing Your Workspace
Personal Kanban: Mapping Work, Navigating Life
The Power of Innovative Thinking
The Power of Leo: The Revolutionary Process For Achieving Extraordinary Results
Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a World That Can't Stop Talking
The Remedy: Bringing Lean Thinking Out of the Factory (Electronic Version Only)
Real Numbers: Management Accounting in a Lean Organization
Safety Performance in a Lean Environment
Seeing the Whole Value Stream: Expanded Second Edition
Secrets of Facilitation: The S.M.A.R.T. Guide to Getting Results with Groups, The
Shortcuts to Creating & Maintaining Organized Files & Records
The Spirit of Kaizen
A proven system for implementing small, incremental steps that can have big impact
on reaching your goals. Filled with practical tips and ready-to-use tools for managers,
innovators, and entrepreneurs. The essential handbook for changing the world.
Systems Thinking: Managing Chaos and Complexity
In a nutshell, this book is about systems. This book is written for those thinkers
and practitioners who have come to realize that while the whole is becoming more and
more interdependent parts display choice and behave independently, and that paradoxes
are the most potent challenge of emergent realities. --ElizabethWohlford
The Talent Code: Greatness Isn't Born. It's Grown. Here's How.
Whether you’re coaching soccer or teaching a child to play the piano, writing a novel
or trying to improve your golf swing, this revolutionary book shows you how to grow
talent by tapping into a newly discovered brain mechanism. --Elizabeth Wohlford
Ten Steps to a Learning Organization
Ten Steps maps the critical path to renewal and mobilizes people's unique talents.--
Focuses on the key element for organizational survival -- adapting to change-- Full
of practical information and tool for transformation. --Elizabeth Wohlford
Theory of Constraints
Walks you through the crucial stages of a continuous program: the five steps of focusing;
the process of change; how to prove effect-cause-effect; and how to invent simple
solutions to complex problems. --Elizabeth Wohlford
Thinking About Quality: Progress, Wisdom, and the Deming Philosophy
An end to the misunderstandings of W. Edwards Deming's work--the book that finally
provides a relationship between his ideas and the way businesses should be run. --Elizabeth
Wohlford
This is Lean: Resolving the Efficiency Paradox
Today's Lean! Learning About and Identifying Waste - Pocket Guide
Today's Lean! Using 5S to Organize and Standardize Areas and Files - Pocket Guide
The Today’s Lean! series of books provide: Concise content on a one main Lean or Six Sigma tool or
concept, Numerous case studies, worksheets, and examples from all types of industries,
Availability as a pocket guide or ebook, A standard format, An avenue to update content
immediately via your feedback and input (via ebook updates), An inspiration for you
to implement something similar. --Elizabeth Wohlford
Toyota Culture: The Heart and Soul of the Toyota Way
The Toyota Engagement Equation
Toyota Kata Building Competitive Advantage with Lean: University of Michigan Improvement-Kata & Coaching-Kata Handbook
Toyota Kata: Managing People for Improvement, Adaptiveness, and Superior Results
Drawing on six years of research into Toyota's employee-management routines, Toyota Kata examines and elucidates, for the first time, the company's organizational routines--called
kata--that power its success with continuous improvement and adaptation. --Elizabeth
Wohlford
Toyota Production System: Beyond Large-Scale Production
Taiichi Ohno--inventor of the Toyota Production System and Lean manufacturing--shares
the genius that sets him apart as one of the most disciplined and creative thinkers
of our time. Combining his candid insights with a rigorous analysis of Toyota's attempts
at Lean production, Ohno's book explains how Lean principles can improve any production
endeavor. --Elizabeth Wohlford
Toyota Way: 14 Management Principles from the World's Greatest Manufacturer, TheThis book is a great read for those who are interested in learning more about the culture and management principles that allowed the Toyota Production System (TPS, or Lean) to evolve. The book provides historical information on Toyota and emphasizes the leadership culture started by the Toyoda family. The book also differentiates between the "Toyota Way" (the culture) and TPS, where the Toyota Way is the set of principles that allow TPS to flourish. Additionally, the book includes many case studies to demonstrate the Toyota Way principles and show what TPS/Lean is and is not. --Megan Johnson
The Toyota Way Fieldbook
A companion to the international bestseller The Toyota Way. The Toyota Way Fieldbook builds on the philosophical aspects of Toyota's operating systems by detailing the
concepts and providing practical examples for application that leaders need to bring
Toyota's success-proven practices to life in any organization. --Elizabeth Wohlford
The Toyota Way to Service Excellence
Understanding A3 Thinking: A Critical Component of Toyota's PDCA Management System
Demonstrates how dynamic A3 Thinking can positively impact corporate culture. Winner of a Shingo Research and Professional Publication Prize --Elizabeth Wohlford
Value-Stream Mapping Workshop: Participant Guide
Who Moved My CheeseThis book is a great read for all ages and pertains to everyone no matter how old. It's easy enough for a younger reader to understand, but the message is relatable for all. It gives great examples of how we must adapt to change when change is inevitable and really makes you understand how change can be a good thing. I liked that there were examples of how one adapts well to change and how one doesn't adapt at all. It comes across very clearly that if you aren't willing to adapt to change, the you'll get left behind. This book would add value to someone who may be considering a life change (new job, relationship, re-location, etc.). It would also be great for an organization who is thinking of implementing improvements or change. It will give them an idea of how change can affect people in different ways. --Kaylee Betzinger
Womack on Lean Management: A Live Video Seminar
In "Womack on Lean Management," you'll hear management thinker, author, and LEI founder
James P. Womack, Ph.D., explain why and how managers and executives must think and
act in new and different ways as part of a new management method called "lean management."
Two – hour long seminar. --Elizabeth Wohlford
Working With Difficult People
Top communications consultant author details specific techniques for handling difficult
people you work with. Easy-to-follow scenarios for every situation are featured in
this handy guide. --Elizabeth Wohlford
How to Succeed with Continuous Improvement
The Office of Continuous Improvement is always interested in expanding its Lean Library. Please send recommendations for Lean resources to improvement@mtu.edu.