It’s that special time of year: open enrollment season. Over the next few weeks, employees will be choosing between plans through their employers. And many other self-employed people will purchase insurance through health care exchanges. A year ago, my wife was pregnant with our second child, so I knew we would face hefty medical bills.…
The role of a parent is a difficult one. First, there’s the burden of the mother to carry a child. Then, that child must be birthed. The next two years of its life that child is completely helpless (note: on occasion this timeframe can extend much further, sometimes into adulthood). Then, you must instruct, teach,…
I recently read a brilliant book called The Big Leap: Conquer Your Hidden Fear and Take Life to the Next Level by Gay Hendricks.
The primary idea in the book is that you have an Upper Limit Problem that controls the degree of overall wellbeing in your life.
The waste of human potential is often described as the eighth waste of lean (in addition to the seven we’ve previously covered). The waste of human potential is likely the most costly form of waste in most companies today. Human potential is wasted when employers have employees do meaningless tasks and functions (such as with…
In our last post in our series on lean, we introduced the seven wastes. Why does waste matter? Waste matters for a number of reasons, though the top three for me are listed below: It’s damaging to the environment It’s expensive It’s slow It wastes human lives and potential I’m going to cover the first…
We’ve previously discussed the importance of focusing on value creation. I like to think of value creation as the importance of rendering service to another human where profit is the thing that lets you do it again. From there, we discussed the entire value stream and the importance of ensuring that your value stream flows…
Today’s post on lean has to do with a topic that’s often misunderstood: perfection. The lean enterprise should pursue perfection. It should continuously improve and work to make each processes leaner along the way. Perfection is a tricky goal, however, as it is a continuously variable goal and one that, by definition, you will never…
I am taking a break from my series on lean to acknowledge my five-year workplace anniversary today. With a background in the oilfields and a bachelor of arts in political science, Trelleborg hired me at a time when unemployment for my demographic was in the double-digits (and underemployment much higher). Since being hired, I’ve been an inside…
Daniel Diffenderfer 