亲爱的现场教练：
精益是一个骗局。最近两年我们请了顾问协助我们进行“精益转型”，他们所做的一切就是不断给我们的团队施加压力要求更多产出，他们还说，如果没有成功的话是因为我们不够努力。我看了很多精益书籍，我觉得像你们所说的“尊重”就像一个烟幕弹，让顾问们可以在不解决公司深层次问题的情况下，迫使团队提高产出。
我明白你在说什么，但我并不打算和你争论，因为我能非常清楚地想象到这样的情况。但在我们进一步讨论之前，需要搞清的第一个问题是：你真的是在做精益吗？还是有人打着精益的旗号向你兜售过时的泰勒主义？
以下是评估你的精益转型计划是否“精益”的三个核心准则：
1. 我们有多么认真地将价值回馈给客户？精益战略是通过消除系统中的浪费（从工程、设计、供应链到工作站的流程中存在的七大浪费）来提升整个供应链的价值，以便将其回馈给客户。经验法则以三分之一来表示：1/3的额外价值给客户，1/3我们自己保留，1/3给为改进工作做出过贡献的供应商们。
2. 我们有多么坚定地在整个供应链中拉动价值？即时拉动系统是一种将整个运营（跨边界协作）与（均衡的）实时的客户需求保持一致的装置。通过缩短横跨价值链的时间周期，在系统中产生一个创造性的张力，让大家在正确的时间以正确的顺序向内部客户（然后是最终客户）提供良好的部件，然后解决由于这种拉力引发的所有问题。
3. 我们有多么坚定地培育员工？培育员工最重要的不是“行政性”地解决问题，而是给每个人提供自己解决问题的手段（主要是目视化管理和支持），并通过开放的管理和有力的系统来支持他们，以便他们自己解决问题。在精益中，我们雇用员工是为了让他们在工作上取得成功，而不只是做自己的工作。
买方注意
我不是不理会你的抱怨，但请根据这三个维度（0到10）评估你的精益工作。评估结果将告诉你，你在做的是真正的精益计划或还是常规的卓越运营计划。
我知道这也许不能帮助你摆脱困境，但这也许能帮你确定被骗的感觉从哪里来。我不认为精益是一个骗局。我相信精益是一种新的经营方式，最初由丰田公司创造，而且目前丰田公司仍然凭借其精益计划、丰田生产系统、丰田开发系统和丰田销售系统在汽车行业遥遥领先。我们正试图搞清它在丰田公司和汽车行业之外能发挥多大作用。
对于那些没有真正致力于精益的顾问而言，他们不过是打着精益的旗号在贩卖过时的东西（最近有很多人打着方针管理的旗号兜售老掉牙的目标管理方法）---对这种做法有什么可说的呢？买家自己当心吧。
关于“尊重”是烟幕弹的指控，这个问题回答起来确实有点复杂。不过我们先来搞清楚，我们所说的“尊重”是什么意思呢？
“尊重员工”这个词的起源似乎是“尊重人性”，但此处他们的含义是完全不同的。这里我们所说的不是有礼貌（尽管这很好），我们说的是尊重“人是人类”的事实。换一种说法：
1. 他们的时间是宝贵的。每个人的生命都在一分一秒地流逝。我们要求他们所做的每一秒无意义的工作，对于他们内心中的人生（或者至少是他们的工作时间）需要有所作为的追求而言，都是一种损害。
2. 当人们没有足够的挑战时，他们会感到无聊；当他们负担过重时，他们会感到压力。“负担过重”是一个有趣的概念，因为它适用于很多不同的场合。要求某人做一个无聊、无意义、重复的任务，在危险的工作环境中工作，或对生产力给予太大的压力都会让人负担过重。我们经常处于负担过重的状态。精益的问题是：在多大程度上和在什么维度？我们可以提供哪些帮助来让他们更好地应对？我们可以做些什么来减轻过重的负担？
3. 人们需要在他们可以信任的团队中工作。没有一个人是活在一个孤岛上，如果你每天期待看到你的同事，那么工作起来一定很开心；或者如果你无法忍受他们，那么工作就会变得很糟糕。尽我们所能支持团队和团队精神是尊重人性的重要组成部分。
4. 人们希望他们的努力得到认可。泰勒主义让我们相信我们需要对人们的成果进行奖励，那可能是对的，但是大多数人都希望他们的努力被认可，同时憎恨那些通过抢夺别人功劳而被奖励或赞扬的不公平的情形。
5. 在创造中有真正的快乐。当一天结束时，如果创造性的工作不是太难（比如通过与系统、他人或管理层进行斗争而做成了某事），每个人都会在创造性的行为中体验到深深的喜悦。一个创意提案系统是任何精益系统的关键---这一点经常被误解。
一个希望，而不是骗局
设计精益系统的目的显然是为富有成效、有意义的工作创造条件。当精益管理的意图是利用工具提高生产力，榨取员工更多剩余价值的时候，我也不知道如何来处理精益。
通过尊重员工的人性来创造有意义的工作条件是我们想要表达的意思。我们应该如何创造工作条件，让工作更自然，而且人们被聘用来在工作中取得成功，而不只是做工作？虽然我写的很多文章有虚构的成分，但是它们都来源于我在现实生活中看到的案例（不过我需要做一些伪装来保护无辜的人和有罪的人）。我相信我们所提出的观点是真实的，没有刻意去隐藏一个丑陋的真相。
精益是一个骗局吗？坦白地说，我并不这么认为，我认为它是一个希望。丰田向我们展示了一种工作和竞争的更好方式，精益是我们理解这一方法，将其转移到丰田和汽车行业之外的努力的总和。我们的努力成功了吗？很显然没有，我们在过程中学到了很多教训（其中最重要的总是回到TPS的基础）。我们才刚入门，未来的路还很长。
有哪一种希望可以变成骗局吗？毫无疑问，精益或其他都有这种可能。我们每天都能看到这样的例子。但请记住，任何骗局都是骗子和被骗者之间的交易，而被骗者总是希望不劳而获。
英文原文：
ISN’T LEAN JUST A SCAM TO SQUEEZE TEAMS FOR MORE PRODUCTION?
Dear Gemba Coach,
Lean is a scam. We’ve had consultants working with us on a “lean transformation” for two years and all they do is put pressure on teams for more and tell us that if it doesn’t work it’s because we don’t try hard enough. I’ve been reading the lean books and I feel that people like you who write about “respect” are pushing a smoke screen that allows consultants to just squeeze teams for more production without ever resolving the company’s deeper problems.
Ouch.
Are you guys pulling? Seriously, I hear what you’re saying and am not dismissing it at all, as I can very well visualize how this can be happening. But before we go further in this discussion, the first question is: Are you really doing lean or have you been sold old-fashioned Taylorism in the guise of lean?
Here are the three core criteria I’d use to evaluate how “lean” is your lean transformation program:
1. How serious are we about giving value back to the customer? The lean strategy is about leveraging value from the entire supply chain by eliminating systemic muda (this is fractal, from engineering, design, and the supply chain to seven wastes on a workstation) in order to give it back to customers. The rule-of-thumb is expressed in thirds: 1/3 extra value to the customer, 1/3 we keep, 1/3 goes to suppliers who have contributed to the improvement effort.
2. How determined are we to pull value across the supply chain? A just-in-time pull system is a device to align the entire operation (collaboration across boundaries) with (averaged) real-time customer demand. By withdrawing at short intervals across the value chain, one creates a creative tension that is focused on delivering good parts to internal customers (and then final customer) at the right time in the right sequence, and therefore solving all the problems that appear as a result of this pull tension.
3. How committed are we to developing people? Working with people means first, not solving problems “administratively” but giving each person the means to solve their own problems (mostly visual management and support) as well as supporting them through both open-minded management and enabling systems so that they do solve their problems. In lean, we hire people to succeed at their jobs, not just do their jobs.
Buyer Beware
I am not dismissing your complaint, but please evaluate your lean effort according to these three dimensions, 0 to 10. This will tell you whether you’re indeed engaged in a lean initiative or just the usual operational excellence program.
I realize this might not help you out of your predicament, but it might help determine where, exactly, the feeling of being scammed comes from. I do not believe that lean is a scam, at all. I honestly believe that lean is a new way of doing business, pioneered by Toyota (who’s still ahead of the game with its lean programs, the Toyota Production System, the Toyota Development System and the Toyota Sales System). We’re trying to figure out what this means outside Toyota and the automotive industry.
As to consultants who are not committed to real lean, but sell the same old tired story as lean (the recent rash is selling grandpa’s management by objectives as hoshin kanri, completely ignoring the “catchball” principle) – what’s there to say? Buyer beware.
As to the charge that writing about “respect” is a smokescreen, well, this is indeed more complicated. Again, what do we mean by “respect”?
The origin of the phrase “respect-for-people” seems to be “respect-for-humanity,” which is quite different when you think about it. We’re not talking about being polite here (although that is good, for sure), we’re talking about respecting the facts that humans are … humans. In other words:
1. Their time is precious: Every human’s life runs minute-by-minute, second by second. Every second of meaningless work we ask something to do is an insult to their profound need to do something useful with their life, or at least their working time.
2. When people are not challenged enough they get bored; when they’re overburdened, they get stressed: “Overburden” is an interesting concept because it can apply in many different situations. Asking someone to do a boring, meaningless, repetitive task is just as much an overburden as a dangerous work environment, or too much pressure on productivity. We’re always overburdening people. The lean question is: how much and on what dimension? What can we do to help them cope better? What can we do to reduce the overburden?
3. People need to work in teams they can trust: No one is an island, and work is great if you look forward to seeing your colleagues, or can become hell if you can’t stand them. Doing everything we can to support teams and team spirit is a large part of respecting humanity.
4. People need to be recognized for their efforts: Taylorism has us convinced we need to reward people for their results, and that may be true, but mostly people need to be recognized for making an effort and hate the unfairness of others apparently being rewarded or praised when everyone knows they’re really coasting and appropriating others’ work.
5. There is real joy in creation: At the end of the day, everyone experiences deep fulfilling joy in creative acts, if the work of creation is not too difficult (such as fighting systems, others, or management to get anything done). A creative idea system is a key – often misunderstood – part of any lean system.
A Hope, Not a Scam
Lean systems are clearly designed to create the conditions for fruitful, meaningful work. How to deal with lean when management’s intent is to use the tool for productivity pressure and squeezing more out of people, I don’t know.
Creating the conditions for meaningful work through respecting people’s people-ness is essentially what we write about: how can we create work conditions where work is more natural and where people are hired to succeed at their job, not just to do their job? Although much of what I write is fiction, I do write it from real-life cases (which I then disguise to protect the innocent and guilty alike). I believe that the points we make are real, and not make-believe to hide an ugly truth.
Is lean a scam? I honestly don’t believe so. I think it’s a hope. Toyota showed us how there can be a better way both to work and compete, and lean is the sum of our efforts to understand this lesson and transfer it outside of Toyota and outside of the automotive industry. Have all our attempts been successful? Clearly not, and we learned many lessons on the way (not the least of which is to always go back to the basics of TPS). Still, here’s the door, and the room is large.
Can any hope be turned into a scam? Absolutely, lean or otherwise. We see this every day. But remember that any scam is a deal between the scammer and the scammed, who hopes to get something for nothing.
（文章来源：LEI 作者： Michael Ballé ）
