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I've been on two Toyota plant tours and visited another 20, or so, plants in Japan. The Georgetown, KY tour was great. The conversation with Gary Convis, President TMMC, was outstanding. Norman Bodek has been on hundreds of plant tours looking at lean. In his words, "I've never learned more on a tour than the one hour we spent with Gary." At the end of the Toyota tour I asked the executives and project coaches to share the lessons they were bringing back to the construction project setting. I went around the room giving each person the opportunity to offer a lesson. We did this two times. Here are their lessons in the order offered:

1. The use of visual management was far more than expected. Will attempt to over communicate project key performance indicators and goals.
2. Stopping to fix the problem — jidoka — could lead to far fewer quality problems.
3. Executives have a role to play in project kaizen activities. Gary Convis, President of Georgetown operations, got involved in kaizens in a coaching capacity.
4. Staff project roles with people with the appropriate skills and interests. Develop the basic skills for the work in construction.
5. Use five whys at the time variances (problems) are identified.
6. Encourage trade labor to change roles throughout the day. This avoids repetitive motion injuries, reduces boredom, and builds an appreciation for the conditions of completion for work.
7. Clean as we go throughout the day. Assign accountability for workplace orderliness. Use indicators — andon — to signal that the work teams recognize that they are keeping their workspaces in a condition for others (and themselves) to proceed with work.
8. Thinking that we already know — that we are the best — is the enemy of learning and becoming lean. We must overcome that.
9. Celebrate success as it occurs. Celebrate the work of teams.
10. A lean approach requires a different culture (from the usual AEC project).
11. Don't hesitate to display banners, mottos, and team improvement projects across the project work site.
12. Keep everyone informed everyday (throughout the day) of the key performance indicators for the project.
13. See that the whole project organization — owner, architect, contractor, sub-consultants, and sub-contractors — are all using the same language of improvement.
14. Training can begin at the earliest encounters with prospective employees. It can help us select the best people for our projects.
15. Have the client involved at appropriate times throughout the project.
16. Pay attention to the details. It can lead to higher quality and customer satisfaction.
17. Evolve a lean approach on projects and throughout the organization. Start with a focus on quality. Follow that with improving production throughput. Finish by reducing costs.
18. Use color charts, displays, and signaling to draw attention to anomalies and to what is important.
19. Organize people into small teams — five people — with a working leader who can fill in for everyone else. Use multi-skilling to develop a response capability.
20. The person performing the next operation is your customer. Make sure people know who will be working next in the workstream, especially when they work for another organization or company.
21. We observed a simplicity in the language at Toyota. Find ways to communicate what is requested, standards of performance, and details so that they will be understood.
22. Have a 15 minute stand-up meeting every morning with all the supervision to review progress and to pursue an improvement agenda. Finish the day with a similar meeting to provide the opportunity for supervision (last planners) to declare complete on the promised work for the day.
23. Establish standard work — the currently understood best way — for key project operations.

I didn't have the opportunity to share my impressions with the group. Here are three key lessons:

• Work to a pace that both allows the team to meet the project goals and doesn't overburden them. Pacing reduces one source of variability while simplifying planning.
• Use improvement activities — project kaizen — as the principal means of engaging project team members in meaningful work that advances their careers.
• As leaders, involve yourself to ease the work of the project team members rather than operating in the illusion that you can control.

Norman Bodek made numerous comments. Here are three of the more memorable ones:

• As managers, adopt the approach of ask questions, don't tell.
• Small, very small improvements that don't require management approval will accelerate project performance. Norman calls it Quick and Easy kaizen. Using that approach Toyota got 40 20 million adopted improvements in 20 40 years. That is more than 100 adopted improvements/person/year.
• Teams are far more creative than individuals. Organize recurring team activities for sharing and improving upon individual creativity.

We'll do a Toyota Georgetown visit again. But before that I am taking another 18 lean construction leaders to NUMMI. That is where Gary Convis started out. I can't wait to listen to the lessons from that tour. I'll share them with you.