T he following is for mature quality audiences only. Is it unwise to take people who are new to lean on a tour of a Toyota facility running at top efficiency? Is the sight of a glossy, mature lean factory a kind of pornography for young engineers, new leaders, and even seasoned managers seeking to boost the business? Is it too strong a dose of what lean thinking can ultimately look like after 50-some years of hard work?

Benchmarking has been around forever, and tours have grown in popularity as companies find the need to acquire momentum to achieve in-this-moment results. I’ve personally led a number of tours to excellent facilities, both in Japan and the United States. There are good to great examples on nearly every continent now, and they are cropping up in sectors other than just manufacturing.

It’s safe to say that 1970s-era manufacturing muda is finally melting as the oceans of proactive process thinkers are rising. This is exciting by itself. Now it’s all about access and options. This provides a rich and tempting resource for consultancies, practitioners, and private groups to arrange tours for their people to “go and see.”

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