Our Roots

TBM has taught and implemented time-based Lean principles for almost 20 years.

Our heritage is rooted in the Toyota Production System (TPS) and its fundamentals, which we learned firsthand through close working relationships with TPS pioneers, including Yoshiki Iwata (below). Mr. Iwata, a member of the team which created the legendary production system, was a primary pupil of Taiichi Ohno, developer of the original TPS concept. In recent years, the Toyota Production System has become more broadly known as lean manufacturing.

Yoshiki Iwata, TPS pioneer and founder
of Shingijutsu, with Anand Sharma, CEO and
Co-founder of TBM Consulting Group

As TBM has helped discrete manufacturers, continuous process companies and service firms worldwide improve their business performance, our approach has itself improved, evolving into the LeanSigma principles we use today. As the name implies, LeanSigma is the combination of lean and Six Sigma, the most powerful business improvement tools developed in the past hundred years.

To understand LeanSigma, it’s helpful to see how it evolved, beginning with the “lean” component. More…