Happy 12th Birthday, AllAboutLean.com!

Yet another year has passed, and AllAboutLean.com is now twelve years old! 630 posts of lean content in English, plus selected blog posts translated into Chinese (thanks to Xie Xuan) and German (myself)! Time to celebrate again! Like every year I am surprised that again I managed to generate a (high-quality?) blog post every week for the last 52 weeks. I also managed to visit a few conferences again.

New Books Since Last September

The main publication in the last twelve months was my latest book, All About Work Standards, going into great detail on how to use work standards for continuous improvement. And, to my surprise, it is selling quite well, around 3-5 copies per day! It is also already available in German, Alles über Arbeitsstandards translated by me, and in French, Tout sur les standards de travail translated by Laurence Drabik and Pierre Jannez from Operae Partners (many thanks!!!). More translations into Spanish, Chinese, Portuguese, Italian, and Polish are in the pipeline. See here for all current and upcoming languages.

With the help of my brother, we also translated my manufacturing fundamentals book All About Manufacturing Fundamentals written in German for my university lectures. This is translated from German to English, and just came out. Do note that this is not a lean book per se. Instead, it is a math-free, comprehensive “Guide to Manufacturing, from Shaping to Forming, Cutting, and Joining, including Shop Floor Etiquette, Product Development and Quality Control.” It also has a chapter close to my heart on how to behave on the shop floor.

More Books in the Pipeline

I am also working on a book on changeover optimization and SMED. But this is still in the works and will take another few years complete. The preliminary title is All About SMED: Setup Reduction, Changeover Sequencing, and Lot Size Optimization for Flexible Manufacturing Systems and Continuous Improvement. I will definitely let you know when it is done!

Another book that is pretty much ready in English and German is my history of manufacturing. Unfortunately, I am still trying to get the rights back from the publisher, and hence cannot publish it (yet). Since then, all of my books have been published by myself (with the exception of some translations), which makes the whole handling of the copyrights much easier. I will also let you know when I get the rights back…

Most Popular Posts

As every year, here are again the most popular posts (of all posts) within the last twelve months.

1. Toyota Standard Work – Part 1: Production Capacity
2. The Toyota Total Link System Chart (TLSC)
3. Toyota Change Point Management: Henkaten
4. The Toyota KPI Dashboard—Productivity
5. Line Layout Strategies – Part 2: I-, U-, S-, and L-Lines
6. The Bowler Chart—Tracking Your Projects
7. The Kingman Formula – Variation, Utilization, and Lead Time
8. What Is Ikigai? (My view: It’s a buzzword)
9. Toyota Standard Work – Part 2: Standard Work Combination Table
10. Hoshin Kanri – Part 4: The X-Matrix? (For some reason, the X-Matrix of Hoshin Kanri made it to the number one in poularity, despite me recommending NOT to use the X-Matrix.)

On the Use of AI and the Em-Dash (“—”)

The internet is getting full with AI-generated articles, usually with dubious content. I want to emphasize again that this blog is still written by hand by me. However, AI does have its uses. I sometimes use it if I need some “eye candy” image that breaks up the text and makes reading easier. The image page (visible after clicking on the image) clearly lists them as AI generated. Images that have hard facts like diagrams, however, are still generated the old-fashioned way, as AI lacks precision.

I also use AI for structure, to get ideas, and to make sure I did not miss an important point. Sometimes, the AI has a genius idea among all the fluff, that I can adapt and use. This helps me to write better articles (still writing them myself).

Albeit, it is harder for me to get noticed among all the AI stuff, and I am getting fewer and fewer clicks despite having more content every week. And, since Google does not earn any money from me (since I don’t even have advertising on this site), I am often no longer on the first page of search results. That is life, and many other blogs suffer from the same problem.

For the reader, it is also hard to distinguish content written by an AI from content written by a real human. Some people believe the use of an em-dash (“—”) indicates that it is written by an AI, since many AIs often use em-dashes instead of the shorter hyphen (“-“) or en-dash (“–”). You will find plenty of em-dashes all over my blog… but also from articles long before AI became available. My first post New Professor, New Blog from September 1, 2013 already featured an em-dash, and I have long since memorized the short code for the em-dash (ALT-151) and the n-dash (ALT-150). Hence, even though you will find em-dashes all over my blog, it is still written by me!

Consulting

The AALean GmbH that my brother and I started in 2023 to teach, coach, and consult is also doing well. We are active on multiple continents, doing anything from fundamentals and advanced trainings to coaching of division managers and plant managers. It feels good to spread the knowledge of lean and operational excellence to the world. It is also great fun. And, this is also a great opportunity to do even more learning by doing.

Overall, it was again a fun year, and I am looking forward to writing even more next year (blog posts and books). Thank you very much, my dear readers, for continuing to frequent my site and for reading my works. Now, go out, keep on reading, implement what you read and organize your industry!