Juran, Joseph M.

Dr. Joseph M. Juran (December 24, 1904 – February 28, 2008) is well known for his work in managing to produce better quality, specifically in post-World War II Japan. Because of the timing and his area of expertise, he is closely associated with Deming. Deming, however, emphasized statistics in his Read more…

Jones, Daniel T.

Daniel T. Jones is one of the pioneers in Lean thinking. He co-authored The Machine That Changed the World and Lean Thinking. Jones is the founder of the Lean Enterprise Academy, part of the Lean Global Network that also includes the Lean Enterprise Institute.

Hajek, Jeff

Jeff Hajek is the author of this reference guide you are reading and Whaddaya Mean I Gotta Be Lean?, a primer on Lean for frontline employees. He also publishes the Velaction.com website, which contains an extensive online directory of Lean terminology and the Gotta Go Lean Blog. He is a Read more…

Graban, Mark

Mark Graban was an early blogger in the Lean community, publishing Leanblog.org. He was a recipient of the Shingo Publication Award for his book, Lean Hospitals. Mark was one of the first people to create a specialty version of Lean, applicable to the healthcare industry. He is a consultant, speaker, Read more…

Ohno, Taiichi

Taiichi Ohno (February 29, 1912-May 28,1990) is considered by many to be the father of the Toyota Production System. He eventually rose to the rank of executive vice president in the company.

While Ohno had many innovative ideas and published several landmark books (see them and other books about him here), perhaps his biggest creative leap was integrating the American supermarket system of resupply into the automotive industry. He was able to lay the foundation for kanban systems, pull, and one-piece flow by changing the way components were supplied to production processes.