• Skip to main content
  • Skip to primary sidebar
  • Skip to footer

Bob Emiliani

Leadership for the Digital Age

  • About Bob Emiliani
  • Speed Leadership
    • Overview
    • About
    • Book
    • Workshops
    • License
  • Books
  • Improvement
  • Blog
  • Contact

My Favorite Quote

August 26, 2013 by Bob Emiliani

My favorite quote is by Eiji Toyoda, former President and Chairman of Toyota Motor Corporation and cousin of the company’s founder, Kiichiro Toyoda. The quote is:

“…employees are offering a very important part of their life to us.
If we don’t use their time effectively, we are wasting their lives.”

These words marvelously capture the basic way of thinking that all managers should have. Further, it summarizes a key aspect of the “Respect for People” principle in Lean management. That is, people want to make valuable contributions in their work every day, and management must take action every day to assure that it happens.

For more than 10 years, this quote has been an essential part of the visual control that I give to executives after Lean leadership training and graduate students after they complete my course in Lean leadership.

Eiji Toyoda will be 100 years old on 13 September. [Note: Mr. Toyoda passed away on 17 September 2013].

Quote source: T. Minoura, “Address to the World Class Manufacturing Forum,” May, 2002

Filed Under: BobEmiliani.com, Lean Leadership, Respect for People

Primary Sidebar

Blog Categories

  • BobEmiliani.com
  • Continuous Improvement
  • Conventional v. Lean Thinking
  • Funny Stuff
  • Kaizen
  • Lean Leadership
  • Lean Practices
  • Lean Principles
  • Lean Teaching
  • Lean Teaching Q&A
  • Lean Tools and Methods
  • Lean University
  • LeanProfessor.com
  • Question & Answer
  • Real Lean v. Fake Lean
  • Respect for People
  • Shared Learning Resources
  • The Back Story
  • Time Machine
  • Voice of the (Student) Customer

Footer

Contact Bob

[email protected]

Providence, Rhode Island

  • LinkedIn
  • YouTube

Goodies

Amazon Author’s Page

YouTube Channel

Faculty Home Page

Sign Up For News

Search Footer Widget

Cubic LLC
© 2021 · Bob Emiliani · Website by Ella J Designs