For millennia, warriors have taken war trophies to commemorate their victories. They range from the souvenir to war reparations to the just plain gory.

We’ve got flags and weapons and things like seagoing vessels, such as the U.S. Coast Guard’s tall ship Eagle—courtesy of the defeated Nazi navy. (My son has a lot of great memories from our visit on the Eagle.) And then there are human trophies—you know, scalps, heads, ears—that kind of stuff.

So, where am I going with this? Lean implementation is a never-ending war. It’s a hard and noble effort, so occasionally we need to smell the roses and reflect. This includes basking (ever so briefly) in the team’s success. A war trophy can help in the commemoration, serving as a poignant and necessary reminder of a substantial past victory… and the possibility of future ones.

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