Journal: Smile Because It Happened

Monday location: Seven || 7:20 am – 8:25 pm

All Smiles: Mike Broderick, Mary McConneloug, and me
photo: Mary McConneloug

Manufacturing Philosophy: Had a conversation today with someone regarding Taiicho Ohno’s Toyota Production System. I heard the common lament, “this won’t work for what we do.” It’s really all a matter of perspective: you only see from where you can see. Because my perspective was different I could clearly see that TPS would work really well with what this person was struggling. I think I got through to the person; probably not. It usually takes about a decade. We’re going to experiment with a few aspects of TPS on this ‘intractable problem’ and see how it goes. I’m confident it will go well if we can invest enough sustained energy on it.
Press: Received a nice mention from Seven Cycles’ fastest customer today. Thanks Whit! Hope to see you out on the trail.

Business Management: Seven Cycles’ largest and most important distributor is visiting this week. E.S. Korea is Seven’s South Korean representative. I’ve written about them a number of times; they are smart, thoughtful, and committed to Seven. We met for a while today working on topics ranging from new product projects on which I’ve been working – and most important – the ones in which they are most interested. We worked their 2013 annual plan and some other work, too. More later.
Graphic Design: About halfway through the 2013 Seven Cycle bike catalogue. This is the companion piece to the Seven Brochure. It’s very different from the brochure – for a very different purpose. Skunk taking point on it.

Post title: “Don’t cry because it’s over, smile because it happened.” – Dr. Seuss