The Myths and Truths of Lean Transformations: How to Successfully Make the Transition from Theory to Effective Deployment

This book is a crucial resource for Lean practitioners (experienced or not) who are seeking: insight on how to gain more from their Lean efforts, how to overcome resistance to change (that is, to effectively convey 'What’s in it for me?' to their business associates), and to understand how other companies have overcome the barriers to implementing Lean and incorporated it as the common-sense approach to continuous improvement.

The author shares his specific experiences with Lean transformations―some successes and some failures. His insightful perspective shows readers how the understanding of Lean progresses from theory to common sense to common practice. The Lean initiative is not merely a transformation of skills, but the development of a robust continuous-improvement culture. The book includes more than 60 case-in-point examples, across a diversified range of industries, based on the author’s hands-on experience with many multinational corporations. These case-in-point examples show transformations that have resulted in $200+ million verified annualized savings for a diversified array of industries. The author details his journey from industry Lean practitioner to a consultant in a top-tier consultancy firm to developing his own consulting practice.

Ray Kelly has more than 20 years of operations and supply chain management experience on a global level. His employers included: Nortel Networks, Cardinal Health, Littelfuse, and Eaton Corporation. In addition, he has served more than 15 years as a management consultant with Deloitte Consulting, PricewaterhouseCoopers, and Coopers & Lybrand. He is:

• A certified Lean Sensei & Enterprise Lean Six Sigma Master Black Belt. Over 16-years utilizing LSS tools and methodologies. 10-years at a Master Black Belt level.
• An innovative operational excellence practitioner, with international manufacturing and consultancy experience across a large diverse range of industries; e.g. Automotive, High-Tech/Electronics, Fast Moving Consumer Goods, Consumer Products, Medical Devices & Pharmaceuticals, Oil & Gas, Heavy Industries, etc. Clients included: Hewlett-Packard, Texas Instruments, Manitowoc Foodservice, Siemens, Unilever, Kao, Shell Oil, Panasonic, Toshiba, Suzuki, Meads-Johnson Nutritionals, Abbott Laboratories, Malaysian Ministry of Finance, Infineon Technologies, British Petroleum, Avnet, 3Com, and StatsChipPac.and others
• A change leader with the ability to motivate, lead and interact with individuals from diverse cultural and business backgrounds; promoting and developing a continuous improvement culture. Worked in 23 countries accross North America, Europe & Asia.

Ray Kelly has a demonstrated track record of delivering outstanding quantitative & qualitative results across enterprises’ internal and external supply chains resulting in US$200-million in cost savings (over past 15-years); whist improving performance through order-fulfillment lead-time reductions, the slashing of end-to-end supply inventories, improving customer service (OTIF), reducing bottom-line operational cost, reducing material/services acquisition costs, reducing defects, improving labor productivity, simplifying manufacturing planning activities, increasing manufacturing capacity, reducing the number of suppliers, reducing supply lead times, improving cash flow, and reducing machine/product changeover times.