Tonianne DeMaria

Consultant and author

Tonianne DeMaria is partner and principal consultant at Modus Cooperandi, and co-founder of Modus Institute and Kaizen Camp. She is co-author of the Shingo Research and Publication Award-winning book, Personal Kanban: Mapping Work | Navigating Life, and the upcoming Why Kanban Works and Kidzban. DeMaria is passionate about the roles collaboration, value-creation, and happiness play in “the future of work,” and appreciative of the ways in which lean thinking can facilitate these ends. She helps clients create cultures where effectiveness is valued over productivity; learning and continuous improvement is ongoing; innovation can take hold; and where healthier, fulfilling, and more integrated lives can result.

Thu, 04/07/2016 - 11:30
The Lean Brain, Part 3: FlowYou can’t step in the same river twice
Tue, 11/28/2017 - 12:02
Lean says: Manage flow. Your brain says: My work isn’t linear. My day is filled with interruptions, and so I don’t have the “luxury” of flow. What’s at play here: functional fixedness. If there is one area where there’s not an obvious transfer of…
The Lean Brain Series, Part 2: Visualization Begets AlignmentPromote constancy of purpose by making the current state explicit
Wed, 11/01/2017 - 12:02
Lean says: Map the value stream. Your brain says: I’ve been doing this so long, it’s become second nature to me. The steps are right here—in my head. What’s at play here: • Illusion of transparency • Curse of knowledge/information imbalance •…
The Lean Brain SeriesFive ways our brain can thwart lean and how to mitigate them
Thu, 09/28/2017 - 12:02
While heading to a session at the most recent Lean Transformation Summit, I found myself confronted with signage that posed the following open-ended question: “All problem solvers must....” Given how the work we do at Modus Cooperandi focuses…
Dream BIG… But Get Those Dreams in WritingThe brain is a pattern-seeking, ambiguity-hating energy hog
Wed, 06/15/2016 - 16:58
No doubt you’ve seen evidence of its ascendance: The cottage industry that’s become a multibillion dollar “motivational industrial complex” of sorts. Its rallying cry, “If you think it, you can achieve it!” is plastered just about everywhere these…
Sleep: Your Workflow’s Most Important Form of SlackSleep better, perform better
Thu, 05/12/2016 - 13:19
“It is a common experience that a problem difficult at night is resolved in the morning after the committee of sleep has worked on it.” —John Steinbeck In Personal Kanban (Modus Cooperandi Press, 2011), Jim Benson and I discuss how workflow should…
Clarity > CoffeeStick with me on this
Thu, 04/07/2016 - 11:30
I recognize that the title of this column might stir up some controversy, especially among fellow coffee enthusiasts. Not to mention it puts me at risk of getting exiled from my beloved adopted home, Seattle. And yes, perhaps “Clarity > Coffee”…