Whilst I am writing this blog the weather outside is atrocious. It's raining very hard, the sky is full of big dark clouds and looking out from the warmth of my living room I can definitely say that I am better off inside than out today!

This scene is reminiscent of times when we have been frantically busy preparing for the introduction of a Lean project. Stress levels are high, due to the sheer amount of actions that still need completing, the smiles that first greeted you in team meetings have now turned into grimaces (due to the actions that still require completing) Bosses are anxious because they have a nervousness that this whole LEAN thing might go pear shaped and to top all this off your own morale is low and something that should have tasted so sweet i.e. the benefit of implementing Lean is now starting to resemble a stale old piece of cheese...

Well fear not! We have all been there. It would have been too easy for Neil Armstrong not to have stepped out onto the moon's surface or for Edmund Hilary to suddenly start to feel dizzy due to the scary heights of Everest and just imagine what would have happened if Mr. Toyota had decided not visit our old friend Henry Ford in his factory in the US because he felt a little travel sick - there probably wouldn't be Kaizen or Lean! It's an old, and perhaps an annoying, cliché but if there's no pain then there's no gain!

Being slightly afraid of heights I don't think that I could have offered much advice to Edmund Hilary, however, having many years experience of implementing Lean I can spot a diamond in the rough. So what could I do to offer support to you Lean pioneers in health care? Well when days were hard, time against you and stress levels high you somehow stuck with it and saw things through, but no one actually stopped to appreciate the essence or the beauty of the masterpiece that you created i.e. that 6S board or that process flow map or that time when the Lean light finally came on in your colleagues' heads! Michelangelo's David had admirers so why can't your visual management masterpiece have the same? Well it can. How? If you feel that you have achieved something that would have put a smile on Michelangelo's, or even Mr. Toyoda's face, and you might not have received the adulation that you feel you deserved, let me know and I will give you a shout on my regular blogs so that together we can honour our brave Lean co-workers all over the country to ensure that they all get the slap on the back that they deserve.

Some might say that this is a little too sentimental but knowing that your efforts have been truly appreciated by others can be priceless!