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The Lean Manager: A Novel of Lean Transformation
Lean is the most important business model for competitive success today. Yet companies still struggle to sustain enduring and deep-rooted business success from their lean implementation efforts. The most important problem for these companies is becoming lean: how can they advance beyond realizing isolated gains from deploying lean tools, to fundamentally changing how they operate, think, and learn? In other words, how can companies learn to go beyond lean turnaround to achieve lean transformation? The Lean Manager: A Novel of Lean Transformation, by lean experts Michael and Freddy Ball, addresses this critical problem. As we move from what Jim Womack, author, lean management authority, and LEI founder, calls the era of lean tools to the era of lean management, The Lean Manager gives companies a definitive guide for sustaining their ability to learn and improve operations and financial performance, while continually developing people. The only way to become and stay lean is to produce lean managers, says Womack. Every isolated effort will recede or fail unless companies learn to use the lean process as a way of developing individual problem-solvers with the ownership, initiative, and know-how to solve problems, learn, and ultimately coach new individuals in this discipline. That's why this book matters so much. The Lean Manager, the sequel to the Ball 's international bestselling business novel The Gold Mine, tells the compelling story of plant manager Andrew Ward as he goes through the challenging but rewarding journey to becoming a lean manager. Under the guidance of Phil Jenkinson (whose own lean journey was at the core of The Gold Mine), Ward learns to use a deep understanding of lean tools, as well as a technical know-how of his plant's operations, to foster a lean attitude that sustains continuous improvement. Where The Gold Mine shows you how to introduce a complete lean system, The Lean Manager demonstrates how to sustain
459 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 2009
49 people are currently reading
382 people want to read
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Displaying 1 - 13 of 13 reviews
May 2, 2025
Freddy and Michael Balle have once again raised the bar for the quality of business novels to an unprecedented level. “The Lean Manager: A Novel of Lean Transformation” is just awesome. Something that's even hard to categorize within this genre. It's the “Godfather” of all business novels. And the comparison to Puzo's creation or Coppola's masterpiece is no accident. But let's take it one step at a time…
Despite the fact that “The Lean Manager” is a sequel to the first novel, it introduces a new protagonist. He's a yuppie. Good education, prestigious and easy job... fly business class and tell people how important it is to implement ERP. No responsibility and a decent salary. So how can such a successful slacker end up as the director of a run-down factory?
Cherchez la femme! You fly to France, meet a French woman, and trade the cognac served in business class for coffee from a vending machine in a factory permeated with the smell of hot plastic, a wife, a son, and a ranch as a dowry.
The factory seems to be coping with its tasks and barely staying afloat. But then a new CEO appears and find no logic in keeping the factory “as is” in an “expensive country”. What a cliché – announcing the closure of a factory at the beginning of a business novel. But Michael wouldn't be a Ballé if he didn't describe this drama in way that leaves a lump in your throat after reading the chapter. At that moment, you realize that there are business novels, and then there are novels about business.
Wait a minute! Who is this new CEO? He looks awfully familiar. Isn't he the one we found hungover at the beginning of the first novel? It's definitely him.
The characters from the first novel have reached a new level. The narrator has written a book about the Lean transformation of an enterprise and has become a very respectable scholar in his academic circles. The HR manager, who left the company in the first novel, has become a successful consultant in the field of lean manufacturing. The completely insensitive sensei... well, things are still the same for him: no compassion for closing factories and a wooden yacht. And the former factory director, as written above, has become the CEO of an international auto parts company.
He upgraded his gold mine. Then he acquired several similar factories and upgraded them too, and then he got out of the business after some disagreement with a partner. Experienced and backed by money from his previous ventures, he's ready to become a business shark. He knows how to transform factories, and now he's ready to pick and choose the ones that don't fit into his plan. Our protagonist and his factory in northern France are obviously the ones not fitting.
I think by this point you've already guessed that the factory won't close at the end of the novel. Moreover, after undergoing a series of transformations, the factory attracted the attention of Japanese component suppliers for Toyota and became a launching pad for their entry into the European market. But “The Lean Manager” is not a novel about factory transformation. It's a novel about the transformation of thinking. The protagonist – the factory director – not only managed to prevent the closure of the factory but also managed to change himself. And this is why the comparison with “The Godfather” is accurate.
What can you learn from this book?
PDCA and 7-step problem solving:
1. Go and See
2. Visualize the problem so that everyone can understand it
3. Measure the gap between the current state and the best possible state
4. Standardize work methods to achieve stable results
5. Learn basic analysis methods
6. Experiment and evaluate the results
7. Make this a practice for everyone
4 dimensions of Go and See:
• Hypothesis testing and forming your own opinion
• Achieving consensus and a common understanding of the problem
• Achieving goals and removing obstacles
• Employee engagement
How to work in A3 format? A step-by-step guide.
Kaizen – 4 ways to organize the continuous improvement process:
• React to daily problems by visualizing them and focusing management on the most significant ones
• Organize cross-functional workshops – Kaizen Events – focusing on various topics with a standardized approach to solving them (continuous flow, quick changeover, 5S, etc.)
• Quality circles that bring together workers from the same area for detailed analysis and problem-solving, facilitated by the foreman and with the involvement of support functions as needed
• A system of individual proposals from workers, in which the foreman provides assistance with formulating the problem, organizing experiments, verifying results, and discussing feasibility with other workers
Criticism
I decided to add some criticism to this review to be fair and to keep the balance. Otherwise, you might think I'm simply praising this book. In reality, “The Lean Manager” is not for every reader.
First, the book contains many situational expressions and not so common words or slang. To read it, you should be comfortable with English and arm yourself some dictionaries. That is the flip side of a lively and engaging narrative.
Second, there are no familiar lean manufacturing tools here. Instead, the book takes us deep into philosophical reflections and the foundations on which all these tools are based. To understand all this, desire alone is not enough, training alone is not enough, experience alone is not enough. You need desire, training, and experience. This is not the kind of business novel that can be recommended to a beginner.
Thirdly, the balance of narration and dialogue is sometimes unsuccessful. This is a subjective judgment. But this small detail is noticeable compared to the first novel. And it's noticeable because you sometimes lose the thread of the dialogues. It's hard to imagine how the discussion took place and what it led the characters to. In other cases, the dialogue turns into lectures. Sometimes this lecture is very well-delivered, as if you were listening to a presentation by one of the authors. Sometimes, it turns into rather tedious reading.
Despite the fact that “The Lean Manager” is a sequel to the first novel, it introduces a new protagonist. He's a yuppie. Good education, prestigious and easy job... fly business class and tell people how important it is to implement ERP. No responsibility and a decent salary. So how can such a successful slacker end up as the director of a run-down factory?
Cherchez la femme! You fly to France, meet a French woman, and trade the cognac served in business class for coffee from a vending machine in a factory permeated with the smell of hot plastic, a wife, a son, and a ranch as a dowry.
The factory seems to be coping with its tasks and barely staying afloat. But then a new CEO appears and find no logic in keeping the factory “as is” in an “expensive country”. What a cliché – announcing the closure of a factory at the beginning of a business novel. But Michael wouldn't be a Ballé if he didn't describe this drama in way that leaves a lump in your throat after reading the chapter. At that moment, you realize that there are business novels, and then there are novels about business.
Wait a minute! Who is this new CEO? He looks awfully familiar. Isn't he the one we found hungover at the beginning of the first novel? It's definitely him.
The characters from the first novel have reached a new level. The narrator has written a book about the Lean transformation of an enterprise and has become a very respectable scholar in his academic circles. The HR manager, who left the company in the first novel, has become a successful consultant in the field of lean manufacturing. The completely insensitive sensei... well, things are still the same for him: no compassion for closing factories and a wooden yacht. And the former factory director, as written above, has become the CEO of an international auto parts company.
He upgraded his gold mine. Then he acquired several similar factories and upgraded them too, and then he got out of the business after some disagreement with a partner. Experienced and backed by money from his previous ventures, he's ready to become a business shark. He knows how to transform factories, and now he's ready to pick and choose the ones that don't fit into his plan. Our protagonist and his factory in northern France are obviously the ones not fitting.
I think by this point you've already guessed that the factory won't close at the end of the novel. Moreover, after undergoing a series of transformations, the factory attracted the attention of Japanese component suppliers for Toyota and became a launching pad for their entry into the European market. But “The Lean Manager” is not a novel about factory transformation. It's a novel about the transformation of thinking. The protagonist – the factory director – not only managed to prevent the closure of the factory but also managed to change himself. And this is why the comparison with “The Godfather” is accurate.
What can you learn from this book?
PDCA and 7-step problem solving:
1. Go and See
2. Visualize the problem so that everyone can understand it
3. Measure the gap between the current state and the best possible state
4. Standardize work methods to achieve stable results
5. Learn basic analysis methods
6. Experiment and evaluate the results
7. Make this a practice for everyone
4 dimensions of Go and See:
• Hypothesis testing and forming your own opinion
• Achieving consensus and a common understanding of the problem
• Achieving goals and removing obstacles
• Employee engagement
How to work in A3 format? A step-by-step guide.
Kaizen – 4 ways to organize the continuous improvement process:
• React to daily problems by visualizing them and focusing management on the most significant ones
• Organize cross-functional workshops – Kaizen Events – focusing on various topics with a standardized approach to solving them (continuous flow, quick changeover, 5S, etc.)
• Quality circles that bring together workers from the same area for detailed analysis and problem-solving, facilitated by the foreman and with the involvement of support functions as needed
• A system of individual proposals from workers, in which the foreman provides assistance with formulating the problem, organizing experiments, verifying results, and discussing feasibility with other workers
Criticism
I decided to add some criticism to this review to be fair and to keep the balance. Otherwise, you might think I'm simply praising this book. In reality, “The Lean Manager” is not for every reader.
First, the book contains many situational expressions and not so common words or slang. To read it, you should be comfortable with English and arm yourself some dictionaries. That is the flip side of a lively and engaging narrative.
Second, there are no familiar lean manufacturing tools here. Instead, the book takes us deep into philosophical reflections and the foundations on which all these tools are based. To understand all this, desire alone is not enough, training alone is not enough, experience alone is not enough. You need desire, training, and experience. This is not the kind of business novel that can be recommended to a beginner.
Thirdly, the balance of narration and dialogue is sometimes unsuccessful. This is a subjective judgment. But this small detail is noticeable compared to the first novel. And it's noticeable because you sometimes lose the thread of the dialogues. It's hard to imagine how the discussion took place and what it led the characters to. In other cases, the dialogue turns into lectures. Sometimes this lecture is very well-delivered, as if you were listening to a presentation by one of the authors. Sometimes, it turns into rather tedious reading.
July 24, 2023
In the same vein as 'The Phoenix Project' or 'The Five Dysfunctions of a Team', this is a business novel, in the sense that it is not written as a textbook, but the principles of lean are shown in practice like a case study. Here, we are following Andy, a plant manager who has been comfortably coasting through his career in recent years, who gets a shakeup by the new CEO of the company, who is convinced his plant has to be closed.
The book is well-written, the plot well constructed and you do gain a lot of empathy with the main character, although he is equally frustrating when he just doesn't get something! He is depicted as a bit of an idiot at the beginning, the type of paper-pusher manager who is completely disconnected from the people, practices and even the budgets that he is working with. You not only follow him at work, but also at home, get to understand his intrinsic motivations, his relationship with his wife, and his behaviours at the office and at home.
The lean content is also strong, and mainly introduced through his boss and mentors he encounters along the way. It's blended into the plot step by step, starting with 'go and see' and ending with 'teamwork'. I did find that mixing in the sort of drilling that the mentors were doing on the main character with the novel style felt heavy-handed, so it didn't flow quite as easily as 'The Phoenix Project' where you can even forget that the material is designed to be educational. Here there is more repetition, which for me became too much.
I was very much enjoying the book at the beginning, the plant, which creates parts for the automobile industry, was easy to follow in terms of questioning their workflows and processes, but as the same themes started to come up over and over again I lost some of that interest. If you would like to know more about the lean movement though, I would recommend this one.
The book is well-written, the plot well constructed and you do gain a lot of empathy with the main character, although he is equally frustrating when he just doesn't get something! He is depicted as a bit of an idiot at the beginning, the type of paper-pusher manager who is completely disconnected from the people, practices and even the budgets that he is working with. You not only follow him at work, but also at home, get to understand his intrinsic motivations, his relationship with his wife, and his behaviours at the office and at home.
The lean content is also strong, and mainly introduced through his boss and mentors he encounters along the way. It's blended into the plot step by step, starting with 'go and see' and ending with 'teamwork'. I did find that mixing in the sort of drilling that the mentors were doing on the main character with the novel style felt heavy-handed, so it didn't flow quite as easily as 'The Phoenix Project' where you can even forget that the material is designed to be educational. Here there is more repetition, which for me became too much.
I was very much enjoying the book at the beginning, the plant, which creates parts for the automobile industry, was easy to follow in terms of questioning their workflows and processes, but as the same themes started to come up over and over again I lost some of that interest. If you would like to know more about the lean movement though, I would recommend this one.
August 18, 2019
The Lean Manager is a novel about a struggling plant manager who is forced by the CEO to come to terms with the fact that he must change or his plant will die. The CEO is pushing from the top that his company becomes an efficient lean organization and this challenges the plant manager who must throw away all his old conventions and transform his organization to survive.
The author, Monsieur Ballé, is one of the original lean sensei and provides the vision of what trials and tribulations a lean manager must go through to accomplish a lean transformation. Ballé makes it very clear in his novel that one person cannot provide everything that it requires the proper team to accomplish the goal of an efficient lean organization that respects people.
I quite enjoy the genre of Business Novels as I feel that they allow you to get inside the heads of the characters in a way that a textbook allows. The storyline of this novel could have been my company or any company I worked for or within the past. Unfortunately, I felt that at times this book was a little wordier than it needed to be, and I would lose interest. The monologues were lengthy as were the chapters. I much would have preferred clearer delineation between work and personal conversations. At times one paragraph would be the protagonist talking with his boss and with little or no transition he is talking with his wife about his day.
If found this a challenging but rewarding novel to read and I would recommend it to anyone who is in plant management or who wishes to get into plant management.
The author, Monsieur Ballé, is one of the original lean sensei and provides the vision of what trials and tribulations a lean manager must go through to accomplish a lean transformation. Ballé makes it very clear in his novel that one person cannot provide everything that it requires the proper team to accomplish the goal of an efficient lean organization that respects people.
I quite enjoy the genre of Business Novels as I feel that they allow you to get inside the heads of the characters in a way that a textbook allows. The storyline of this novel could have been my company or any company I worked for or within the past. Unfortunately, I felt that at times this book was a little wordier than it needed to be, and I would lose interest. The monologues were lengthy as were the chapters. I much would have preferred clearer delineation between work and personal conversations. At times one paragraph would be the protagonist talking with his boss and with little or no transition he is talking with his wife about his day.
If found this a challenging but rewarding novel to read and I would recommend it to anyone who is in plant management or who wishes to get into plant management.
August 15, 2018
Managementboek in romanvorm. Leest daardoor best lekker weg, al had het wat dunner gemogen, best veel herhaling. Vertelt de worsteling van een fabrieksmanager in Frankrijk die een nieuwe CEO krijgt en uit alle macht probeert te voorkomen dat zijn fabriek moet sluiten. Hiervoor moet hij alles op alles zetten om ‘lean’ te leren werken. Het productieproces moet beter, efficiënter, meer gericht op de vraag enz. Door gesprekken met de CEO en andere adviseurs leert hij steeds beter te kijken naar wat de echte problemen zijn en ook om de werkvloer meer en beter te betrekken bij het vinden van goede oplossingen.
December 26, 2013
I enjoyed this book immensely because it is in a novel style format which allows you to see the principles in an actual work situation instead of wondering how they work or making your own interpretation of the principles.
While this format isn't for everyone, I found it helpful and it made the book extremely easy to follow. Implementation is quite a different issue, however, as the thought processes are completely different to most American business practices.
I think it's a must read management book and I recommend it highly.
While this format isn't for everyone, I found it helpful and it made the book extremely easy to follow. Implementation is quite a different issue, however, as the thought processes are completely different to most American business practices.
I think it's a must read management book and I recommend it highly.
Currently reading
February 23, 2012Lean rules & tools are all well and good. But there's something fundamentally different that Management must do - an entirely different set of behaviors, questions to ask, things to focus on - versus the "professional" management stuff you learn in business school. Just showing the worker bees how to "see waste" and "think lean" without the right supporting management processes leads to frustration and disappointment.
June 10, 2012
Thick book, well written in story format. Helps all of us align the lean concepts with our job. Interesting quote, "The ones with the biggest training manuals are the leanest." Thank the ones who bring problems up to be solved!
October 28, 2014
Excellent book. What the novel format brings to the table is the "recognition factor" in Andy's exploits, especially his doubts and turnarounds. The actual content of lean knowledge is second to none I would say, at least unless you go to actual cases.
January 2, 2015
The Balle books are absolutely some of my favorites. They are written as novels and do an exceptional job at sharing that process of learning by doing, making mistakes, and understanding how a lean transformation takes place.
January 4, 2010
Excellent lean book on how a lean manager should be doing lean
October 5, 2012
Sequel to "The Gold Mine". Lean for managers in novel form.
May 20, 2013
Well-explained ideas of lean management for beginners in a form of an easy-to-read novel. Oriented mostly on manufacturing processes, but applicable also in other areas.
April 4, 2013
This book really stuck with me. It is written in a story format (similar to The Goal) that I found surprisingly engaging.
Displaying 1 - 13 of 13 reviews