GA 111 | How to Teach Continuous Improvement with Dr. Bradley Miller

You're listening to episode 111 with Dr. Bradley Miller.

Welcome to the Gemba Academy Podcast, the show that's focused on helping individuals and companies achieve breakthrough results using the same continuous improvement principles leveraged by companies such as Toyota Del Monte and the U.S. department of Defense. And now, here's your host, Ron Pereira.

Hey, there. This is Ron Pereira with Gemba Academy, and I'd like to welcome you to another edition of the Gemba Academy podcast. As always, thank you so much for taking time out of your your day and your week to listen to the show and for watching our Lean and Six Sigma training videos over at Gembacademy.com, we definitely appreciate each and every one of you. Now, here's a quick hit. If you're not a Gemba Academy customer and you want another easy way to find a bunch of different videos that we produce, go over to our YouTube channel. Just search for Gemba Academy and go to our channel. Got tons of free videos on there. Most of these videos are also available for free on our regular website, so you can. You can really go to either place. But if you're a YouTuber, definitely check us out over there. Now, today, I'm excited to welcome Dr. Bradley Miller to the show. Now, Dr. Miller is a professor at the University of Houston, and he teaches students primarily about Lean and Six Sigma and also some other business principles. But what we spend our time talking about today is really how he goes about teaching these young folks about Lean. And he's not really. He's not just teaching them. They're actually doing stuff with what they've learned. In fact, they're running different projects, and we explore what some of those different projects are. Normally, it's where these students kind of work, you know, as a side job or whatever it might be. They're applying Lean to their jobs there, so it's pretty cool. He's really covering the theoretical side of things, but definitely having them practice what they've learned. So that was pretty nice. So show notes for this particular episode can be found over@gembapodcast.com, just look for episode 111. Again, gembapodcast.com and look for episode 111. Okay, enough from me. Let's get to the show. All right, Dr. Miller, thanks so much for coming onto the show. Where are you calling in from?

Thanks. It's good to be here. I'm calling from Houston, Texas, and you can feel free to call me Brad.

Oh, Brad. All right. Well, that's easier, I guess. Dr. Miller's not too hard, but Brad's definitely easier. All right, so what are you doing in Houston? I understand you spent some time at a particular school.

Yes. Yeah, you know, I learned I was looking forward to coming on this podcast with you, because I was. That's at Ohio State is where I really started teaching Lean and learning some from those. Those folks up there about some techniques for teaching teaching lean and some things that work in the classroom, and really enjoyed my time at Ohio State. But I'm in Houston now and teaching at the University of Houston in Bauer College of Business. And, yeah, I love it. I get to teach about Lean and Six Sigma and Continuous Improvement and interact with students and some of the companies that they're working for as well. So it's a lot of fun for me.

How long have you been teaching?

I guess on and off for about 10 or 12 years.

Oh, wow.

Okay. I've been at the University of Houston for the past five or six.

Yeah. Well, I guess you guys, your football team stole Ohio State's offensive coordinator, Tom Herman. So I don't know. I give you a hard time about that a little bit.

That's right. Yeah.

Guys had a great season last year, so. All right, well, let's just kind of jump into things. And, Brad, I'm curious if you could maybe share a little bit about your background and how you first came to learn about continuous improvement.

Sure. I think I've really always kind of been involved with or interested in Kaizen or improving things, improving the way that work is done or the things that I'm doing. But really where I realized that this was fun and that if this is something I could do was at my first job, I was working at a manufacturing company and in a supervisory role, and we got to our busy season, and so I got put onto second shift. And I don't know if you've ever worked a second shift.

I have, actually. Yes, I did.

It is. It's. It's not fun. And I did not enjoy being on second shift. And so I told my boss I want to move back to first shift. And my boss told me, well, we have to build all these shopping carts, you know, every day we got to build this many. And, you know, we can. We need two shifts to do it. So if you can figure out a way that we can do with all the stuff that we have here and the people that we have to build twice as many in half the time, then come on back to first shift. We'll do it all there. So I didn't know a whole lot about continuous improvement at the time, but just used. I had an engineering background, so I knew a little bit about systems, but stumbled on doing point of view storage and some line balancing things and some process improvements, standard work sorts of things, and was able to accomplish it. And I found out that was a lot of fun. And I found out, you know, I kind of have an affinity for this and enjoy it. So that's where I started reading more about it and really pursuing opportunities at different companies or with different people to be able to practice and learn more.

So was it safe to say you were kind of practicing lean in the real world before you became a professor?

Yeah, well, yes, absolutely. Now, you know, in that job, in that first job, I was not practicing lean or really anything close to it. Now we, you know, we did process improvement and really improve the process. But as far as culturally it really understanding the real power behind, you know, what we practice as lean now, I really had no idea. I was definitely in a very traditionally managed organization and just trying to make things work. But then over the years I worked at a company and got to practice some theory of constraints, sorts of stuff, so I was getting closer there. And then at another company, they were practicing lean. And so I got to dive in and really do a lot of really fun stuff related to lean there and really learned a lot about the culture. And I continue to continue to learn and revise my thinking and the way that I, the way that I approach life now as well.

So what brought you to the world of academia then?

So I was looking for, I was looking for a career. When we moved, my wife and I were moving because of a job opportunity that she had. And typically what would happen is I'd say, well, let's, you know, we'll move in and I'll find a job. You know, as long if there's, if somebody's making something, where we're going, I'll find a job because I've got enough history and background. I can, you know, I can work anywhere. And so I was evaluating my career and looking at what do I like about what I do and what do I, you know, not enjoy as much and realize that the stuff that I enjoyed was teaching people how they could make their jobs better. And the most fun parts of my jobs and all the jobs that I've had, the most fun part of it is teaching someone how they can use a tool or technique or just think about things differently to make their job better and just seeing the look in their eyes. And I know you've seen people this, Ron, but you just see that look in people's eyes where they have this realization, you know what? My life is gonna be better. My job is gonna be better, because I'm, you know, I'm making this change and doing things differently. And, you know, it's not getting, you know, more complex or harder. It's actually getting simpler and easier and more fun, you know, and their eyes get real big. And I just enjoyed that the most. And I thought, I wonder if there's a way that I can, you know, that I could do this full time. And so that's really where I pursued getting into academics so that I could interact with students and especially as they're just starting out, I teach undergrads. So I really enjoy connecting with these students right before they're embarking on their first careers and hopefully imparting a little bit of, you know, wisdom knowledge about. About lean and about management and about how, I guess, how work can be, you know, And I know that there's a lot of companies out there.

Yeah.

That have different management styles, but sort of give them a vision about how things can be when they get into management.

Exactly. All right, very good. Well, Brad, as you know, we like to start all of our shows with our guests sharing a quotation that possibly inspires them. So do you have one?

I do know that you're going to be asking for a quote, because I listen to your podcast.

Well, thank you.

And, yeah, really enjoy it. And I was looking for a quote that. I was looking for a quote that related to kind of where my mind is at right now. And I couldn't find a single one that kind of wrapped it all up. And so I was just kind of thinking that my idea here, as far as a quote, is I seek to inspire excellence in others by pursuing excellence myself. And that's kind of where I am right now. I think at some point we, as lean leaders, we get really good at what we do, and we sort of become the experts in whatever area we're in. People look to us for advice, you know, as the resident expert about something. And in those situations, I think it's really easy for us to get complacent and to stop growing. Because there's no one that's really pushing you externally.

Yes.

And that's one thing that I do, is I purposefully work to try to make improvements in my own life and in my job and the things that I do on a daily basis and continually work on that. I think that that, that personal practice is important for inspiring the people that work around us. So for me, a lot of it is, of course, people that I interact with each day, but especially my students. It's one thing for me to tell them or show them or help them with a homework or a project assignment and show them where I want them to go with something, but I think it's different when they see that I'm using those same things in my personal life and that they're effective for making my life better.

You're living it.

I am hoping. Yeah. That that's inspiring. Inspiring people to make changes for themselves.

Got it. All right, well, tell us a little bit about like what, what exactly you do teach your students as it pertains to. Let's maybe start with lean.

I teach, I try to teach an overview of lean. So it's an, it's a senior level undergraduate class.

Okay.

And so I approach it from the perspective of trying to improve processes. And so we start out the class talking about what, what is a process and that, you know, processes don't just happen in car manufacturing plants, they happen in services, they happen in personal processes as well. And that all processes have waste. So we sort of start out there and then I try to teach the students how to identify waste and processes, how to have a lean mindset, be able to look at processes and the people that are in them from a long term lean perspective. And then we start to do some, use some tools, some of the tools of Lean and give them in class practice using some of the tools or using some of the techniques. And then I have them do a project during the class where they have to improve a real process on their own. And so they choose something that's meaningful to them and they go and evaluate it. So they're diagramming out the process, making process measurements, identifying waste, looking for value added, non value added sorts of things, using things like 5s and visual management to make some pretty big improvements. And I love seeing how, you know, they're sort of in their first time through. They can kind of surprise themselves as to some of the really big improvements they can make in some of these processes.

Okay, so I've got several follow up questions that just came to my mind, but I want to jump back to. You were talking about kind of like in class simulations and so forth. Talk a little. Give me an example of something that you do there.

You know, I'll tell you my favorite one to do is one that I actually created when I was in industry and it demonstrates the Principle of one piece flow and of the power of reducing the batch size. And so, as I tell my students, I was working at this company and this is what I wanted to do. You know, I knew that these large batches that we were doing was slowing us down and causing us to not be able to diagnose problems. And problems were kind of festering because of it and we weren't able to meet customer needs and it was costing us a lot of money. And so the direction that I wanted to go was just reducing the batch sizes. It was something that we could definitely do in the company. But the problem was that as a result, there wouldn't be a whole lot of inventory on the shop floor and there would be some people in the business that would be standing around or would be perceived that they were just standing around doing nothing. And I knew that the top managers in the company were not going to like that very much if they walked down and didn't see any work happening and did not see any results of any work, and they'd start freaking out. So I created the simulation and it uses pennies and we stack pennies up and move them down a table and we do it side by side processes and it's a scaled down version of a real manufacturing process. And at the end we discover that by reducing the batch size, we end up having a lot faster process. We're able to diagnose problems better. It costs us less money, lots less management that we have to do to get things through the process. And it's really eye opening. Some of the fun stuff I like to tease my students with is we sort of measure speed and efficiency at the beginning of the process. And you know, when you're measuring efficiency and you have process steps that are not the bottleneck, when you start reducing that batch size, they look like they, they get a lot less efficient, it appears, because they've got to do setups in between. And so I always tease my students with, you know, like I'm making a mistake, you know, well, wait a second. Or is this, this new process that I want to go to is less efficient and slower? Is that something we really want to do? And of course, we do the demonstration in class and it takes all class session, but it's fun to see how much better the entire process can be just by reducing the batch size. Anything else?

Yeah, there's something powerful about one piece. Fellow simulations, a story. I don't know if I've ever actually told this on camera or into a microphone, but before gimba Academy was born. I had my own little personal blog that I wrote on, and. And I had this idea, you know, we've all read Lean Thinking and about Womack's kids helping him with stuffing envelopes. And he talks about that, you know, how they gravitated to batch. And then he convinced them to try One Piece Flow. And One Piece Flow clearly was faster, or so the book said. So I thought, huh, I wonder, maybe I should really actually run that simulation. So I did it. And I did it. I got my wife's, I don't know, like, $100 camera, digital camera back then, and I somehow propped it up on some ladder or something in my. In my. In my kitchen, and I think I was really high tech, and I had some Home Depot lights clipped to the cabinets, and I remember almost burning my house down with that.

So.

But anyhow, I hacked this video together somehow, right? And I put it on my blog and it went like, berserk. Got like a hundred Comments in like 24 hours of people saying, you're playing tricks. You know, this is funny camera work or something like that.

And.

And I got to thinking, man, there might be something to this video business. And so that was like the precursor to Gimba Academy, because I love it.

That's great.

Because of One Piece Flow, you know.

So many things, I think, in the way that most of us as Americans are brought up and probably other places in the world too, kind of run counter to lean, you know, as far as, you know, well, if we want to do it faster, let's. Let's get big. Let's do bigger, you know, I don't know, we want to do our laundry faster, so let's buy a bigger washing machine or, you know, do them bigger batches. What do you know, I want to make cookies. And so while I may as well, while I'm at it, I may as well make two, you know, and. Yeah, and so we kind of get into that. That mentality or just the whole, I don't know, sort of big box shopping experience, you know. Well, you know, I don't want to buy toilet paper for a long time, so let me go to the, you know, the big store where I can buy a pallet of toilet paper and then I won't have to buy it anymore. Yeah, and then we need a bigger.

House to store all the paper.

There's so many things that of course, you and I see all that waste. Right. But that's part of training, I think, you know, people in our businesses or for me, training my Students to be able to see that waste of, you know, you may have saved a couple of pennies on one piece of the process, but how many pennies are you spending in other parts of your process to make it all work and make it all fit?

Exactly. All right, so give me an example of a project one of your students has done.

I had. I do. I have students that do, you know, projects every semester, different ones. So I'm trying to think of some that are. That are more recent. Have students that do restaurants. One specifically, there was like a. It was a bakery. And so in the back sort of area, they had the front shop, but in the back area, they had a lot of the food colorings and the different mixes for things and frostings. And I don't know what all that they had in there. And they had work tables in there. And so they would do, like, some pre work in there. And so as a result, you know, they. They went in, reorganized the entire product flow and actually created some flow where, you know, if you walk into that area, there's definitely a, you know, this is what happens first, second, and third and how it all works. And then, you know, 5s and visual management all in there. So, yeah, that was kind of. That was kind of neat. Another, you know, it's stuff that I encourage students to pick things that they're frustrated at.

So now they work these places or they just go to these places?

Yeah, they work there, Yes. I had another student that worked at one of these shipping locations, you know, where you take your box of stuff, or you take your stuff and you say, hey, you know, box this up. So they've got an area sort of off to the side where they box those things up. And this student was frustrated that they could never find the tools that they needed. They always ran out of boxes. They didn't know what boxes they had, and there was no real process. And sometimes there's one person working back there, and sometimes there were two people working back there. So they reconfigured the flow and actually made a sort of standard work process for boxing up a customer's orders and how that works. Sort of had two little production lines there, and again, use visual management things to sort of lock it in. Another student worked at, like, a retail department store sort of place and was frustrated that it always took so long to unload the trucks and get the new clothes off the trucks and onto hangers and then out onto the shop floor. And at the end, then the back area was just trashed with all the Packaging material and everything that was strewn all over the place. And they saw lots of waste in the process. And so, you know, reconfigured the process, ended up having a lot cleaner back office type area and able to get the clothes off the truck and onto the shop floor a lot quicker with fewer people.

Well, what makes me really happy to hear is that, you know, many times when you think about students learning in a classroom and so forth, it's like, yeah, information in and out, maybe let me pass an exam. But your folks, your kids are really practicing, they're really applying it. So that's pretty awesome.

Yeah. I think one of the important things for me in teaching and teaching Lean is that people have the opportunity, the students have the opportunity to actually practice. And there's part of it, you know, they've got to understand things. We've got a book that we read, and so they've got to understand some facts.

Sure.

So that's part of it. But where I really try to get them to learn is through practicing. And I encourage them. After every class, I tell them, you know, this is one of those classes that if you want to, you can leave class after every class session and go home and you can try it on your own. You can actually do this someplace at home or in your own personal processes or at your workplace and try it out and see how it works. So.

So obviously, as you know, we Lean thinkers, we're all about our tools, and tools are important. But we know for sure the most important aspect of Lean is the human side. So I'm curious, how do you kind of get that across to your students that, you know, some people may want to, I don't know, punch you in the throat when you come to them with Lean, you know, how do you overcome people that want to punch you in the throat? You know, so, you know what I mean? Like, that's the hard part, right? The human side. So how do you teach that?

Yeah, there's a couple of things that I do. So we read, you know, several articles about having a lean mindset and how lean managers think. We have a discussion about the long term viewpoint of Levine. And I know, you know, this is an old kind of analogy, but the, the analogy of our organizations as an organism, so we talk through that kind of organism viewpoint and how, you know, mistreating employees or not treating employees well is, you know, is not going to be beneficial long term in the organization. So we talk about those sorts of things. And as I talk through the tools, we also talk about ways that you can use the tools or introduce the tools with people so that it's not a. Okay, we're going to use this tool now.

So I understand that you're able to grade papers faster than the average professor. What's the secret?

Well, I don't know, you know, I don't know who's going to listen to this. So maybe we might not say, well.

Yeah, because I've already, I've already gotten you in trouble with your students. So you mentioned three projects, but I'm sure you've had many more students. So just get ready to be in trouble for that.

It's one of the things. Grading exams is one of those things that I definitely take pride in. So I see that as a. That's a process that's repeatable. So we have four exams. So four times during the semester I have the opportunity to do this process with. I've got a couple of assistants that help me out. And in this process the students want to know their grades as quickly as possible. And so I talk with my students all the time about this. You know, this is a process that involves a lot of non value added activities, you know, taking papers and stacking them and putting them in boxes and carrying them to a room and laying them out and you know, so all these non value added things that do nothing to grade the paper. But over the years I've worked on ways with my instructional assistants and I make sure that my assistants, their graduate students are involved with lean as well. So they're learning it, you know, in the class. I have them sort of sit in on the class and learn about what we're learning. And so we work on removing waste from that process. And I think for a couple of exams this semester, we were able to get the grades out in just a couple of hours. So the last student took the exam and a couple of hours later the grades were up on our website. So you know, this is interesting, Ron, because we were talking about one piece flow. And so I struggle with this in regards to the exams because I've got 150 students in the class and the way that I process the exams is in a batch of 150. So I grade all the exams and then I get all the grades on black on our website and then I make the grades visible to all the students at once. I could actually get the grades to the students quicker if I move toward one piece flow where. And I could, we could actually do this, you know, where student grades the. Or hands the exam in sort of in the middle of an exam period and we could grade the exam on the spot, put the grade up on our website and then grade the next one and put it up on the website and grade the next one and put it up on the website. And so, you know, the average student would probably get their grade in 15 minutes.

So like, I guess one question that is kind of ringing in my mind, maybe it is other folks is why not just have them whip out their iPad or whatever and take the exam electronically and is that not possible? Like tech, technically speaking.

But you know, there are, there's constraints in terms of the academic honesty and making sure that, you know, unfortunately there's still, there are a lot of really great students. Unfortunately there's still, you know, there are some students who are going to try to take advantage of whatever situation you give them. And we do have some electronic exams. But you know, as you mentioned that it makes me think back that one of the things that we teach in Lean is that before going to, before moving to a technological or an automation solution, we fix the process, let's evaluate the process first. Let's remove waste from the process and let's figure out how to do the process manually where it's flexible. And then if we still need to shave time off or still need, you know, some advantages, that's where we use technology to, you know, to sort of fit in.

Yeah, yeah. Don't want to automate waste.

I think that's more where I am, you know, with this class there's going to be some that are multiple choice questions, some are handwritten, graded questions, you know, where it's something written that we have to do. But yeah, but I'm still working on it, you know, and I work on it every, every semester. And I do, I hear from students that the exams are get out, the results get out pretty quickly, which makes me pretty proud. But I also let them know there's still plenty of waste in that process, you know, and like I said, like I was saying, one of my hesitations to going to one piece flow is that some students would get their exam grades back very quickly and others would have to wait longer. And so there's not that consistency in terms of the customer's perception of how long it takes for the exam grades to get back. And so I haven't decided yet whether that's a good thing or not a good thing.

Got it, Got it.

I'm still thinking about it.

So I'm curious if you could go back to your very first day on the job as A professor. And you yourself, like Brad today, could go back and speak to Brad of yesteryear, and you had two minutes to spend with yourself, and you could give yourself any advice there was as it relates to lean. No stock market advice or anything like that, of course, but just like real advice as it relates to teaching students about continuous improvement. What would you say to yourself, if anything?

Wow. I think that I would. I think I'd tell myself to be more involved with. With the lean community around me, and that's something that I'm doing now. But I think, you know, earlier in my career, in my teaching career, I was, you know, trying to get through the teaching process, and, you know, what am I going to talk about today? And stand up in front of students and what are we going to say and how are we going to grade and what assignments are we gonna give? Which is all definitely part of it. But now something that I definitely do is engage more in the lean community. So listening to. Listening to podcasts, you know, involved with the. With social media, involved with different folks that are around locally that practice lean, bouncing ideas off of them, learning from them. And really, as you know, lean is an area that's continually growing, and we're all learning and we're all improving together. And so having those connections, I think, is important for staying current and learning more and improving.

Got it. Good. All right, well, let's go ahead and transition into the reflection section. And the first question, as you know, since you listen to the show, is all about respect for people, which can be kind of hard to define. So I'm curious, what does respect for people mean to you?

Yeah, and that's a hard one. I think it's a hard one for me to define. One of the things that. I know you've heard this a lot, Ron. People will say, you know, you can't practice lean here because we don't make cars or we don't make, you know, whatever it is, wherever they've heard, you know, that lean's applied, we don't do that. Our place is different, so you can't apply that. So I think for me, when I think about respect for people, I've got to think about it in terms of the stuff that I do. And, you know, I don't have real direct employees. You know, we're not necessarily making something. So as I practice lean myself, I've got to. The people that I'm thinking about are the unique students that I have. And like I said, I'm teaching, you know, 150 students a semester. And they all come from a different background. So they've all been to different gembas, they've all been to. Had different experiences, work experience, life experience. And it's, you know, it's my job to communicate the power of Lean and Six Sigma principles for improving processes for them. And I realize I have to. Part of that respect for people is understanding that they're gonna. Each of them will learn at a different pace and in different ways. So for me, it's, you know, I try to present the information in a lot of different ways. You know, some students learn by just being told things or others by experiencing things or seeing things. We'll show some videos in class or I'll do some demos, others by reading or doing, like, on a project. And so I try to give my students a variety of different experiences so that they can learn in their own best way. And one thing that I've learned as well over the years, as far as respect, is that some of them learn at a different pace and learn different ways. And so sometimes I'll get questions from students and I'll feel in my mind that I've already addressed the question. But I'm realizing more and more, you know, that there are going to be some students that the way that I explain it one way, it just doesn't connect with them. And so we sort of have to go about it, go around it a different way and continue talking about it. So staying patient as well.

The old TWI precept that if the student hasn't learned, a teacher hasn't taught. Right?

I guess so. That's a painful one for me. Right?

Yeah. Right. All right. Hey, what's the best advice you've ever received?

You know, I can't really pinpoint a single sort of piece of advice, but over my career, I've received this kind of advice from people in several books that I've read. And that is that when you're trying to get someone to learn something new or try something new for trying to get someone to change the way that they're working or change something in their life, that it's important to frame conversations around what's going to benefit that other person. So many times in Lean, we kind of have a vision of we know how good a process can be. We kind of have that vision in our minds, at least for me. Sometimes it can be easy for me to jump ahead to where my vision is and just say, well, if you just do this, everything will be fine. But it's important that people have the Opportunity to learn how to do this for themselves. And in doing that, I think really encouraging them by telling them that when you use lean or practice lean, your job is not going to become harder and more complex. The goal here is to make your job more simple and more straightforward and easier and more fun. You know, your job, your whole job experience should get better as a result of this experience and not worse.

Do you have a personal productivity habit others might benefit from?

Yeah, I do. This comes from, I guess Stephen Covey and Dale Carnegie both made it popular, and that is do the most important thing first. So for me, for productivity, I'll sort of have my list of things that I need to or want to get done during the day. And it's important for me. And this takes some discipline. And sometimes I don't do this, but things are definitely better for me when I do pick the thing that is the most important for me to get done and do that one first. And I found that when I do that, typically the quality of my work on that thing gets better and I end up doing it faster because I'm much more focused getting on it first thing, and then I have more time for other things later on.

I love it. Let's say you're having a bad day or a bad week and you need to kind of just recharge and refocus. Do you have a routine or ritual that you follow to make that happen?

I do. And I wish I could find some research to back this up because I love doing this, but I take a nap is what I do. So, you know, I just. Especially if there's a problem that I'm trying to solve and I'm just sort of feel like I'm hitting my head against a wall on it, I'll just take a break and, you know, go lay down. Lay down on the couch for a bit and take a little nap. And I find that when I do that, it kind of. Well, it relaxes my whole body, but relaxes my mind. And many times I'll wake up from the nap with a lot more clarity of mind about where I want to go with a particular issue, particular problem.

Yeah, sleep. Super important man. There's a lot of neuroscience that backs it up. Just go to PubMed and put in nap and you'll find a million articles.

I'm sure I'll do that.

All right, so do you have any knowledge or skill area that you feel you need to improve in order to become better at practicing lean?

Yes. You know, I'm still working on doing A better job at engaging students with lean and out. Of, you know, all the students that I teach during a semester, there's a few that really embrace the ideas and they talk to me. I had several students come to me just this past week, and it's so exciting hearing them. Hearing them be excited about lean and excited about going out into their workplace and starting to use this knowledge, use these tools. There's a large section of the class that gets it, that understands lean, understands lean concepts. I'm not sure that they're totally bought into the idea, but I'm confident that when they encounter lean in their jobs, and I'm sure that they will. That. That they'll remember, you know, what we talked about in class and those concepts and be able to reflect back on those things, and it'll be a great place to build their. Their lean knowledge. But then there's this other group of students that I can tell, you know, don't. Don't get it. They just don't. Haven't bought into the concepts or, you know, haven't completely been sold on the ideas and are sort of, I think, just trying to get through the class. You know, part of that. I don't. I don't blame them necessarily for doing that, but part of my. Part of my goal in the class is pursuing a zero defects, sort of an environment where, you know, kind of my ideal state that I'm reaching for from a lean perspective is that all the students connect with the topic. And I've gotten better over the years at connecting with students and inspiring them, but there's always the students that I miss. And, you know, that's disappointing to me when that happens. So I definitely do a lot of reflection at the end of the semester, you know, and at the end of every class, you know, what did I do well? Where could I have done better? How could I have engaged the students better or gotten them involved more? Yeah.

Well, sounds like your heart's in the right place, and I'm sure you're impacting these kids more than they realize. And, you know, you plant seeds and what happens down the road, you may never know, but I think the work that you're doing is fantastic, and I really applaud you for it.

Well, thanks. I don't know the answers to some of those things, but I keep looking, keep. Keep working at it. But that's. I guess that's true for all of our jobs. Just continuously improve, right?

Yep, exactly. All right, well, thanks so much, Brad, for taking time. I know you're very busy. Why don't you just share some final words of wisdom and then why don't you tell people how they can connect with you?

Yeah, well, I'll do that. I think the last thing I have is just to connect, connect with the lean community. And these days it's so much easier than ever with social media. And so I'd encourage people to listen to podcasts like yours, participate in social media, Twitter, LinkedIn, talk with people, find out when people are going to be in your area and go meet them, talk with them, share experiences and learn together so people can connect with me. Certainly I'm on Twitter leankaizen and I'm on LinkedIn and I'm starting to do some things on Instagram and Tumblr, but LinkedIn is probably one of the best ways to get in touch with me.

And it's just your name on LinkedIn.

Yes.

Okay. We'll link to everything in the show notes as well. All right, well, thanks so much, Brad, for taking time and hopefully we can meet up one day and sit down and trade some more stories.

Definitely. I'd love to do that.

All right, take care of.

Thanks.

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