Wednesday, October 20, 2010

Lean Bloggers at Shingo Conference


One of the best reasons to attend Lean Conferences like the NE Shingo Prize Conference held in Providence, Rhode Island this week is to meet fellow lean thinkers and sharing our lean experiences and ideas. As seen pictured above (L to R) are Mark Hamel (Gemba Tales blog and author of Kaizen Event Fieldbook), Tim McMahon (A Lean Journey blog), David Kasprzak (My Flexible Pencil blog) and myself-Mike Wroblewski (Got Boondoggle blog) who met up at this Conference. We had excellent opportunities over the course of the conference to discuss all things lean, attend great sessions, get inspired by lean stories and dig deeper into many lean topics. What a great way to learn from true lean thinkers that not only “get it” but actually “live it” which personally fired me up to get back to work helping others on the lean journey.

But it did not stop with just fellow bloggers. I met and talked with many lean thinkers and practitioners included my new friends at GBMP (led by Bruce Hamilton as seen in the Kaizen Toast Video), Jeff Fuchs (Director of the Maryland World Class Consortia) and many, many others.

Gochiso-sama! This is Japanese for “it was a feast” and an expression of gratitude after a full meal. Our discussions and learning at the NE Shingo Prize Conference left me filled with ideas much like a Thanksgiving feast only without the ready-to-nap feeling, more like ready-to-RUN!

Thanks guys for helping me expand my lean thinking. Kampai, my friends!

3 comments:

Mark R. Hamel said...

Mike,

Man, you beat me to the punch. Maybe I'll get our 4 blogger pic on Gemba Tales tomorrow! Hopefully, I won't look quite as goofy as I do on this post.

I really enjoyed the Lean fraternity at the NE Shingo!

Mike Wroblewski said...

Mark,

The only reason I beat you to the punch is the fact that my connecting flight in Charlotte was delayed almost 3 hours due to mechanical issues. So much for TPM. I didn't get home from Providence until 3:30 AM.

You don't look goofy any more than the rest of us.

I enjoyed our lean fellowship too!

David M. Kasprzak said...

Mike,

Thanks for the conference round-up and for posting the pic! I have determined, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that the camera makes people look 10 pounds balder. When I said I wanted to look thinner I didn't mean my hair!

NE Shingo was amazing. Thanks for the many chats as we sat in the breakout sessions. The intensive experience gave me enought to contemplate that I'll be thinking about all of it until next year.

Hope to see you there!