
Standard Work for Leaders ◾ 61
By the time I saw the supervisor, four days after he returned from
vacation, he swore he would never deviate again from his standard-
ized work. At the same time, he acknowledged the powerful pull of
past practices (supervisor as firefighter), though he was also struck by
the comparison in effectiveness of the old and new approaches. He
has been a faithful adherent of standard work, for both himself and his
team leaders, ever since.
CASE STUDY 3.5: THE VALUE OF STICKING TO THE PLAN
A new team leader had been on the job only a few weeks and had no
precedents to follow. Her area, which covered two assembly lines that ...