Augmented Lean E-Book

Natan Linder

• Herausgeber: John Wiley & Sons
• Kategorie: Fachliteratur
• Sprache: Englisch

Seitenzahl: 557

Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2022

Beschreibung

Explore the real future of work in this expert tech implementation guide that goes beyond automation In Augmented Lean: A Human-Centric Framework for Managing Frontline Operations, serial startup founder Dr. Natan Linder and futurist podcaster Dr. Trond Arne Undheim deliver an urgent and incisive exploration of how to facilitate agile processes amongst a millennial workforce that already lives by many of its tenets. The book demonstrates how to abandon legacy industrial technology that is failing modern operations and hindering operational excellence and digital progress. As an executive and leader, you cannot fall prey to hyped-up notions of industry 4.0's factory of the future automation, artificial intelligence, internet of things, sensors, digital twins, and augmented reality fixing every problem. Instead, to truly reduce cognitive load, complexity, and frustrations in the workplace, we must build cyber-physical technologies so that humans remain at the center. Leaders must ensure that the technology they deploy at an industrial scale has fluid interfaces that demonstrably simplifies work and makes operations more flexible without introducing fear, uncertainty, or doubt. The authors provide: * A step-by-step walkthrough of the Augmented Lean framework that shows readers when, how, and why to augment your workforce through cyber-physical principles that go beyond both Lean and Agile management practices * Concrete strategies on how to scale these operational augmentation methods throughout your organization based on real-world case studies of operators in the trenches of manufacturing whose impact far outweighs their seniority in the corporate hierarchy * Insightful advice for how to use the augmentation framework in small- and medium-sized enterprises where license and training costs are prohibitive when only using off-the-shelf industry 4.0 approaches A thoroughly practical playbook for augmenting your workforce with the latest cyber-physical adaptations to digital technologies, Augmented Lean provides you with the organizational-, process-, and management-level techniques you need to get the most out of your employees. In turn, as an operator, engineer, or industrial worker reading this book, you will become empowered to be a change agent through no-code interfaces instead of remaining a recipient of endless training demands and ever-increasing technological complexity. Augmented Lean will orient you towards the future with the most effective tools to cut through hype so you can instantly apply your learnings and be productive wherever you currently operate.

Leseprobe

Table of Contents

COVER

PRAISE FOR

AUGMENTED LEAN

TITLE PAGE

COPYRIGHT

LIST OF FIGURES AND INTERVIEWS

LIST OF TABLES

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

ABOUT THE AUTHORS

INTRODUCTION

WHO ARE THE FRONTLINE WORKERS?

WHAT IS AUGMENTED LEAN?

HOW IS THIS BOOK ORGANIZED?

REFERENCES

PART I: THE EVOLUTION OF INDUSTRIAL LEAN

CHAPTER 1: THE EVOLUTION OF FRONTLINE INDUSTRIAL WORK

INDUSTRIAL FRONTLINE WORKERS AND TECHNOLOGICAL REVOLUTIONS

INDUSTRIAL REVOLUTIONS THROUGH HISTORY TO THE FUTURE

CONCLUSION

REFERENCES

CHAPTER 2: FROM CLASSIC LEAN VIA AGILE TO DIGITAL LEAN AND BEYOND

WHAT IS DIGITAL LEAN?

BEYOND DIGITAL LEAN: HOW INDUSTRIAL NO‐CODE EMPOWERS OPERATORS

BEYOND POINT SOLUTIONS

THE EMERGENCE OF FRONTLINE OPERATIONS

CONCLUSION

REFERENCES

CHAPTER 3: THE STATE OF PLAY IN INDUSTRIAL SOFTWARE

AN OUTLIER RESHAPING THE INDUSTRY

THE ADVENT OF 3D COMPUTER‐AIDED DESIGN

THE EMERGENCE OF MANUFACTURING EXECUTION SYSTEMS

CONCLUSION

REFERENCES

CHAPTER 4: THE JOURNEY PAST DIGITAL LEAN

DMG MORI’S INTEGRATION WITH TULIP

A DIGITAL BOOST TO MEDICAL MANUFACTURING: ANOTHER JOURNEY

CONCLUSION

REFERENCES

PART II: THE COMING OF AUGMENTED LEAN

CHAPTER 5: THE AUGMENTED LEAN FRAMEWORK

CLASSIC LEAN VS. DIGITAL LEAN VS. AUGMENTED LEAN

CORE PRINCIPLES OF AUGMENTED LEAN

CONCLUSION

REFERENCES

CHAPTER 6: HOW TO ROLL OUT INDUSTRIAL TECHNOLOGY THE RIGHT WAY

THE GLOBAL LIGHTHOUSE NETWORK: TOP‐DOWN SYNTHESIZED BEST PRACTICES

FOUR DISTINCT WAYS TO DIGITALLY TRANSFORM AN INDUSTRIAL ORGANIZATION

CONCLUSION

REFERENCES

CHAPTER 7: DEMOCRATIZING OPERATIONAL TECHNOLOGY USING THE DYNAMIC CAPABILITIES OF THE ORGANIZATION

NO‐CODE AND LOW‐CODE

LEVERAGING ORGANIZATIONAL CAPABILITIES

CONCLUSION

REFERENCES

PART III: ENGINEERING, TECH, AND SKILLS

CHAPTER 8: THE EMERGENCE OF THE DIGITALLY LITERATE INDUSTRIAL ENGINEER

THE EVOLUTION OF THE INDUSTRIAL ENGINEERING FIELD

ENGINEERING: THE HYBRID OF SCIENCE, TECH, AND INNOVATION

THE SLOW EVOLUTION OF CONTEMPORARY INDUSTRIAL ENGINEERING

THE NEED TO RAMP UP CHANGE

CONCLUSION

REFERENCES

CHAPTER 9: TRAINING THE PROCESS ENGINEERS OF THE FUTURE

THE PROCESS ENGINEER: TODAY AND TOMORROW

HOW TO AVOID TRAINING THE WORKFORCE FOR YESTERDAY'S CHALLENGES

REIMAGINING TRAINING

OPEN‐SOURCE MANUFACTURING

WHAT WORKFORCE TRAINING ENABLES AN ENGINEERING MINDSET?

CONCLUSION

REFERENCES

CHAPTER 10: FROM AUTOMATION TO AUGMENTATION

THE STATE OF PLAY IN INDUSTRIAL ROBOTICS

WHERE ROBOTICS IS MAKING AN IMPACT ON THE FACTORY FLOOR

AUTOMATION IS MORE THAN ROBOTICS

WHAT AUTOMATION HAS ACCOMPLISHED

WHAT AUGMENTATION IS AND WHAT IT WILL BECOME

CONCLUSION

REFERENCES

PART IV: AUGMENTED LEAN OPERATIONS

CHAPTER 11: THE POTENTIAL AUGMENTING POWER OF OPERATIONAL DATA

FROM AUGMENTED REALITY EXPERIMENTS AT MIT TO FRONTLINE OPERATIONS PLATFORM

THE PROMISE OF MACHINE MONITORING

THERE'S LOTS OF BIG DATA IN MANUFACTURING, BUT CAN WE USE IT?

MACHINE LEARNING IN MANUFACTURING

CASE STUDY: THE IMPACT OF OPERATIONAL DATA IN DATA IN LIFE SCIENCE OPERATIONS

CONCLUSION

REFERENCES

CHAPTER 12: FACILITATION OVER CONTROL: HOW THE INDUSTRIAL SYSTEMS OF THE FUTURE MIGHT EMERGE

WHY DOES SPACE MANUFACTURING SUDDENLY MAKE SENSE?

THE SIZE AND SHAPE OF THE FUTURE INDUSTRIAL PIE

HOW LONG WILL IT TAKE FOR INDUSTRY 4.0 TO MATURE?

THE FUTURE OF INDUSTRIAL OPERATIONS

THE WORKFORCE QUESTIONS

BUILDING A MOVEMENT

CONCLUSION

REFERENCES

CHAPTER 13: RECONFIGURING GLOBAL SUPPLY CHAINS

BOOSTING J&J'S DIGITAL SUPPLY CHAIN WITH AUGMENTED LEAN APPROACHES

DIGITAL ORDERING PROCESS IN THE UK'S LARGEST FLOWER BUSINESS

BUILDING AND TRUSTING IN SUPPLY CHAIN RESILIENCE

THE RESILIENCE OF GLOBAL SUPPLY CHAINS

THE LESSONS FROM DIGITIZING GE

REMAINING CHALLENGES: TACKLING PORT CONGESTION

THE FUTURE OF SUPPLY CHAINS

CONCLUSION

REFERENCES

CHAPTER 14: CONCLUSION: AUGMENTED LEAN MANAGEMENT OF THE EMERGING, FRONTLINE INDUSTRIAL WORKFORCE

AUGMENTED LEAN MANAGEMENT FOR THE FRONTLINE WORKFORCE

BUILDING THE AUGMENTED LEAN COMMUNITY

REFERENCES

INDEX

END USER LICENSE AGREEMENT

List of Tables

Chapter 1

Table 1.1 From Automation to Regeneration

Chapter 5

Table 5.1 A Juxtaposition of Classic Lean, Digital Lean, and Augmented Lean...

Chapter 6

Table 6.1 Broad Typology of Lighthouses

Table 6.2 Critical Capabilities of a Frontline Operations Platform

Table 6.3 The Emerging Manufacturing Tech Stack

Table 6.4 Typology of Industrial Transformation Approaches

Chapter 9

Table 9.1 Types of Corporate Customer Education Courses

Table 9.2 Essential Courses for the Digitally Enabled Frontline Workforce

List of Illustrations

Introduction

Figure I.1 The Frontline Workers on the Shop Floor.

Interview I.1 A Female Fighter in a Manufacturing SME. Episode 16. Interview...

Chapter 1

Figure 1.1 What Industrial Revolutions Are All About.

Interview 1.1 The Fourth Industrial Revolution post‐COVID‐19. Episode 9. Int...

Resource 1.1 World Economic Forum's Global Lighthouse Network.

Chapter 2

Figure 2.1 Tulip Use Cases.

Figure 2.2 Frontline Operations Are Everywhere: On Shop Floors, in Labs, and...

Interview 2.1 Freedman's Factory: What Is No‐Code? Interview with Mark Freed...

Interview 2.2 Freedman's Factory: Introduction. Interview with Mark Freedman...

Interview 2.3 Digital Lean. Interview with Edward Atkins. Episode 36. Augmen...

Interview 2.4 The Challenge of Frontline Operations. Interview with Jason Di...

Chapter 3

Figure 3.1 The Paradigm Shift in Industrial Software from Top Down to Bottom...

Interview 3.1 A Brief History of Manufacturing Software. Interview with Rick...

Interview 3.2 Digital Manufacturing in the Cloud. Interview with Jon Hirscht...

Resource 3.1 Gartner's Magic Quadrant Manufacturing Execution Systems, 2021....

Chapter 4

Figure 4.1 The Journey Towards Augmented Lean.

Interview 4.1 DMG MORI's Digital Lean Journey. Episode 74. Interview with Ma...

Interview 4.2 Bottom Up and Deep Digitization of Operations. Episode 14. Int...

Interview 4.3 Digitizing Medical Device Operations. Episode 63. Interview wi...

Video 4.1 Tulip Apps on DMG MORI Machines.

Case study 4.1 DMG MORI Uses Tulip to Digitize Their Spindle Assembly Line....

Case study 4.2 Tulip’s Apps Helped Dentsply Sirona Cut Training Times by 75%...

Chapter 5

Figure 5.1 The Augmented Lean Framework.

Chapter 6

Figure 6.1 Guided Greenhousing: combining “lighthouse” inspiration with “gre...

Interview 6.1 A Renaissance in Manufacturing. Episode 4. Interview with Enno...

Interview 6.2 Disrupting Dialysis by Digital Operations. Episode 70. Intervi...

Interview 6.3 Digitizing Medical Device Operations. Episode 63. Interview wi...

Chapter 7

Figure 7.1 The Liberated Operator Thinks and Acts on Data.

Interview 7.1 The Future of Digital in Manufacturing. Episode 21. Çağlayan A...

Video 7.1 Terex – Rock Hill, SC – Tulip COVID Scanning Station.

Chapter 8

Figure 8.1 The Disciplines of Digital Industrial Engineering.

Interview 8.1 The Future of Engineering Education. Episode 22. Interview wit...

Chapter 9

Figure 9.1 Application areas that benefit from open source manufacturing app...

Interview 9.1 How to Train Augmented Workers. Interview with Elisa Roth, Doc...

Interview 9.2 Work of the Future. Interview with Elisabeth Reynolds, Executi...

Interview 9.3 Human‐Robot Interaction Challenges. Interview with Kel Guerin,...

Interview 9.4 Reimagine Training. Episode 3. Interview with Sarah Boisvert, ...

Interview 9.5 What Is Tulip University? Interview with John Klaess, Product ...

Interview 9.6 Smart Manufacturing for All. Interview with John Dyck, CEO at ...

Resource 9.1 Ready Academy ‐ a free online training resource in robotics aut...

Resource 9.2 Tulip University.

Chapter 10

Figure 10.1 From Automation to Augmentation.

Resource 10.1 The World Economic Forum's Augmented Workforce Initiative.

Chapter 11

Figure 11.1 Human‐Centric Capturing of Data.

Interview 11.1 Bridging the Physical‐Digital Divide in Industrial Tech. Inte...

Interview 11.2 The Augmenting Power of Operational Data. Interview with Rony...

Interview 11.3 Emerging Interfaces for Human Augmentation. Interview with Pa...

Interview 11.4 From Predicative to Diagnostic Manufacturing Augmentation. In...

Interview 11.5 Industrial Machine Learning. Interview with Roy Shilkrot, Chi...

Interview 11.6 Life Science Manufacturing Systems. Interview with Gilad Lang...

Interview 11.7 Pharma 4.0. Interview with Michelle Vuolo, Tulip. Episode 31....

Interview 11.8 Life Science Manufacturing Systems. Interview with Gilad Lang...

Chapter 12

Figure 12.1 Software‐Defined Manufacturing.

Interview 12.1 Making Factories in Space. Episode 34. Interview with William...

Interview 12.2 Business Beyond Buzzwords. Episode 42. Interview with Jeff Im...

Interview 12.3 Get Manufacturing Superpowers. Interview with Dave Evans, CEO...

Interview 12.4 Manufacturing 5.0. Interview with Kathryn Kelley, Executive D...

Interview 12.5 Designing a Worker Friendly Industrial System. Interview with...

Interview 12.6 The Automated Microfactory. Episode 29. Interview with Brian ...

Interview 12.7 Analysts Shape Markets. Episode 35. Interview with Kim Knickl...

Interview 12.8 A Female Fighter in a Manufacturing SME. Episode 16. Intervie...

Interview 12.9 Scaling Software Movements. Episode 41. Interview with Hilari...

Chapter 13

Figure 13.1 The Augmented Supply Chain.

Interview 13.1 Digitized Supply Chain. Episode 43. Interview with Arun Kumar...

Interview 13.2 The Digital Journey of a Flower Wholesaler. Episode 61. Inter...

Interview 13.3 Industrial Supply Chain Optimization. Episode 68. Interview w...

Interview 13.4 Business Beyond Buzzwords. Episode 42. Interview with Jeff Im...

Case study 13.1 When MasksOn Needed a Logistics System, They Built One with ...

Case study 13.2 When Demand Disappeared Overnight, Double H Nurseries Stood ...

Chapter 14

Figure 14.1 Managing the Evolving Physical Configuration of the Industrial W...

Resource 14.1 The Augmented Podcast.

Guide

Cover Page

Praise for Augmented Lean

Title Page

Copyright

List of Figures and Interviews

List of Tables

Acknowledgments

About the Authors

Table of Contents

Begin Reading

Index

Wiley End User License Agreement

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Praise for Augmented Lean

“Essential reading for CEOs, masterfully structured, clarifies the pivotal role of technology in the lean domain without resorting to hyperbole. Cleverly balances visionary insight with great implementation guidance.”

—PASCAL BORNET, Author of Intelligent Automation, and LinkedIn Top Voice in Tech

“Tech entrepreneur Linder and futurist Undheim brilliantly argue why augmentation is better than automation. This book provides a clear direction for next‐gen operational excellence. If you're in search of manufacturing excellence, search no more: Augmented Lean is the thing to do and this book tells you how.”

—PROF. DR. TORBJØRN NETLAND, Chair of Production and Operations Management (POM), Department of Management, Technology, and Economics, Swiss Federal Institute of Technology, ETH Zürich

“The world is changing towards a platform‐based economy. This book gives perfect answers about augmented work and how it multiplies the effects on human ingenuity and automation on each other. The book guidelines the bridge between the digital and physical perspective and will promote future understanding on developments in industry towards platforms. A must read!”

—CHRISTIAN THOENES, Chairman of the Executive Board, DMG MORI

AUGMENTED LEAN

A HUMAN‐CENTRIC FRAMEWORK FOR MANAGING FRONTLINE OPERATIONS

NATAN LINDERTROND ARNE UNDHEIM

Copyright © 2023 by Natan Linder and Trond Arne Undheim.

Published by John Wiley & Sons, Inc., Hoboken, New Jersey.

Published simultaneously in Canada.

No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, scanning, or otherwise, except as permitted under Section 107 or 108 of the 1976 United States Copyright Act, without either the prior written permission of the Publisher, or authorization through payment of the appropriate per‐copy fee to the Copyright Clearance Center, Inc., 222 Rosewood Drive, Danvers, MA 01923, (978) 750‐8400, fax (978) 750‐4470, or on the web at www.copyright.com. Requests to the Publisher for permission should be addressed to the Permissions Department, John Wiley & Sons, Inc., 111 River Street, Hoboken, NJ 07030, (201) 748‐6011, fax (201) 748‐6008, or online at http://www.wiley.com/go/permission.

Limit of Liability/Disclaimer of Warranty: While the publisher and author have used their best efforts in preparing this book, they make no representations or warranties with respect to the accuracy or completeness of the contents of this book and specifically disclaim any implied warranties of merchantability or fitness for a particular purpose. No warranty may be created or extended by sales representatives or written sales materials. The advice and strategies contained herein may not be suitable for your situation. You should consult with a professional where appropriate. Further, readers should be aware that websites listed in this work may have changed or disappeared between when this work was written and when it is read. Neither the publisher nor authors shall be liable for any loss of profit or any other commercial damages, including but not limited to special, incidental, consequential, or other damages.

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Library of Congress Cataloging‐in‐Publication Data is Available:

ISBN 9781119906001 (Hardback)

ISBN 9781119906018 (ePub)

ISBN 9781119906025 (ePDF)

Cover Design: © Tulip

Cover Images: © kornkun/Adobe Stock, © kuroksta/Adobe Stock

LIST OF FIGURES AND INTERVIEWS

Interview I.1

A Female Fighter in a Manufacturing SME. Episode 16. Interview with Lena Jaentsch, Business Development Specialist at HERMA Group. Augmented podcast.

Figure I.1

The Frontline Workers on the Shop Floor.

Interview 1.1

The Fourth Industrial Revolution post‐COVID‐19. Episode 9. Interview with Francisco Betti, Head of Advanced Manufacturing and Production, World Economic Forum. Augmented podcast.

Resource 1.1

World Economic Forum's Global Lighthouse Network.

Figure 1.1

What Industrial Revolutions Are All About.

Interview 2.1

Freedman's Factory: What Is No‐code? Interview with Mark Freedman. Episode 22. Augmented podcast.

Interview 2.2

Freedman's Factory: Introduction. Interview with Mark Freedman. Episode 15. Augmented podcast.

Figure 2.1

Tulip Use Cases.

Interview 2.3

Digital Lean. Interview with Edward Atkins. Episode 36. Augmented podcast.

Figure 2.2

Frontline Operations Are Everywhere: On Shop Floors, in Labs, and at Warehouses.

Interview 2.4

The Challenge of Frontline Operations. Interview with Jason Dietrich, Head of Commercial Operations at Tulip. Episode 73. Augmented podcast.

Figure 3.1

The Paradigm Shift in Industrial Software from Top Down to Bottom Up.

Interview 3.1

A Brief History of Manufacturing Software. Interview with Rick Bullotta. Episode 10. Augmented podcast.

Interview 3.2

Digital Manufacturing in the Cloud. Interview with Jon Hirschtick. Episode 23. Augmented podcast.

Resource 3.1

Gartner's Magic Quadrant, Manufacturing Execution Systems, 2021.

Figure 4.1

The Journey Towards Augmented Lean.

Interview 4.1

DMG MORI's Digital Lean Journey. Episode 74. Interview with Marius Schmiedt, Head of Operational Excellence, DMG MORI. Augmented podcast.

Video 4.1

Tulip Apps on DMG MORI Machines.

Interview 4.2

Bottom Up and Deep Digitization of Operations. Episode 14. Interview with Dr. Damir Hrnjadovic, Managing Director, DMG MORI Digital GmbH. Augmented podcast.

Case study 4.1

Dmg Mori Uses Tulip to Digitize Their Spindle Assembly Line.

Interview 4.3

Digitizing Medical Device Operations. Episode 63. Interview with Dan Ron, Lead Engineer, Dentsply. Augmented podcast.

Case study 4.2

Tulip’s Apps Helped Dentsply Sirona Cut Training Times by 75% while Reducing Errors in a Complex Knitting Process. Tulip Use Case: Dentsply Sirona.

Figure 5.1

The Augmented Lean Framework.

Interview 6.1

A Renaissance in Manufacturing. Episode 4. Interview with Enno De Boer, Partner, Digital Manufacturing Lead, McKinsey. Augmented podcast.

Figure 6.1

Guided Greenhousing: combining “lighthouse” inspiration with “greenhouse” workforce initiatives.

Interview 6.2

Disrupting Dialysis by Digital Operations. Episode 70. Interview with Marc Nash, Vice President of Manufacturing at Outset Medical, Inc Augmented podcast.

Interview 6.3

Digitizing Medical Device Operations. Episode 63. Interview with Dan Ron, Lead Engineer, Dentsply. Augmented podcast.

Figure 7.1

The Liberated Operator Thinks and Acts on Data.

Interview 7.1

The Future of Digital in Manufacturing. Episode 21. Çağlayan Arkan, VP of Manufacturing Industry at Microsoft. Augmented podcast.

Video 7.1

Terex – Rock Hill, SC – Tulip COVID Scanning Station.

Figure 8.1

The Disciplines of Digital Industrial Engineering.

Interview 8.1

The Future of Engineering Education. Episode 22. Interview with Babi Mitra, Founding Executive Director of the New Engineering Education Transformation (NEET) Initiative at MIT. Futurized podcast.

Interview 9.1

How to Train Augmented Workers. Interview with Elisa Roth, Doctoral Student at the Institute for Manufacturing at the University of Cambridge. Episode 2. Augmented podcast.

Interview 9.2

Work of the Future. Interview with Elisabeth Reynolds, Executive Director, MIT Task Force on the Work of the Future. Episode 7. Augmented podcast.

Resource 9.1

Ready Academy ‐ a free online training resource in robotics automation for manufacturing professionals, teaching the skills needed to design, deploy, manage and troubleshoot robotic automation.

Interview 9.3

Human‐Robot Interaction Challenges. Interview with Kel Guerin, Co‐founder, Ready Robotics. Episode 6. Augmented podcast.

Interview 9.4

Reimagine Training. Episode 3. Interview with Sarah Boisvert, Founder and CEO, Fab Lab Hub, LLC and the Nonprofit New Collar Network. Augmented podcast.

Figure 9.1

Application areas that benefit from open source manufacturing approaches.

Resource 9.2

Tulip University.

Interview 9.5

What Is Tulip University? Interview with John Klaess, Product Education, Tulip. Episode 72. Augmented podcast.

Interview 9.6

Smart Manufacturing for All. Interview with John Dyck, CEO at CESMII. Episode 17. Augmented podcast.

Figure 10.1

From Automation to Augmentation.

Resource 10.1

The World Economic Forum's Augmented Workforce Initiative.

Interview 11.1

Bridging the Physical‐Digital Divide in Industrial Tech. Interview with Rony Kubat, CTO and Co‐founder of Tulip. Episode 66. Augmented podcast.

Figure 11.1

Human‐Centric Capturing of Data.

Interview 11.2

The Augmenting Power of Operational Data. Interview with Rony Kubat, CTO and Co‐founder of Tulip. Episode 80. Augmented podcast.

Interview 11.3

Emerging Interfaces for Human Augmentation. Interview with Pattie Maes, Professor at the MIT Media Lab. Episode 24. Augmented podcast.

Interview 11.4

From Predicative to Diagnostic Manufacturing Augmentation. Interview with Roy Shilkrot, Chief Scientist, Tulip. Episode 81. Augmented podcast.

Interview 11.5

Industrial Machine Learning. Interview with Roy Shilkrot, Chief Scientist, Tulip. Episode 47. Augmented podcast.

Interview 11.6

Life Science Manufacturing Systems. Interview with Gilad Langer, Industry Practice Lead, Tulip. Episode 78. Augmented podcast.

Interview 11.7

Pharma 4.0. Interview with Michelle Vuolo, Tulip. Episode 31. Augmented podcast.

Interview 11.8

Life Science Manufacturing Systems. Interview with Gilad Langer, Tulip. Episode 78. Augmented podcast.

Interview 12.1

Making Factories in Space. Episode 34. Interview with William Bruey, CEO and Co‐founder at Varda Space Industries. Augmented podcast.

Interview 12.2

Business Beyond Buzzwords. Episode 42. Interview with Jeff Immelt, Venture Partner, NEA, Former CEO of General Electric. Augmented podcast.

Interview 12.3

Get Manufacturing Superpowers. Interview with Dave Evans, CEO and Co‐founder, Fictiv. Episode 13. Augmented podcast.

Interview 12.4

Manufacturing 5.0. Interview with Kathryn Kelley, Executive Director, Ohio Manufacturing Institute. Episode 67. Augmented podcast.

Interview 12.5

Designing a Worker Friendly Industrial System. Interview with Erik Mirandette, Head of Product & Ecosystem at Tulip. Episode 75. Augmented podcast.

Figure 12.1

Software‐defined Manufacturing.

Interview 12.6

The Automated Microfactory. Episode 29. Interview with Brian Mathews, CTO, Bright Machines. Augmented podcast.

Interview 12.7

Analysts Shape Markets. Episode 35. Interview with Kim Knickle, Research Director, Verdantix. Augmented podcast.

Interview 12.8

A Female Fighter in a Manufacturing SME. Episode 16. Interview with Lena Jaentsch, Business Development Specialist at HERMA Group. Augmented podcast.

Interview 12.9

Scaling Software Movements. Episode 41. Interview with Hilarie Koplow‐McAdams, Venture Partner at NEA. Augmented podcast.

Case study 13.1

When MasksOn Needed a Logistics System, They Built One with Tulip in Four Days. Tulip MasksOn Case Study.

Interview 13.1

Digitized Supply Chain. Episode 43. Interview with Arun Kumar Bhaskara‐Baba, Head of Global Manufacturing IT, Johnson & Johnson. Augmented podcast.

Interview 13.2

The Digital Journey of a Flower Wholesaler. Episode 61. Interview with Andy Burton, Managing Director, Double H Nurseries Ltd. Augmented podcast.

Case study 13.2

When Demand Disappeared Overnight, Double H Nurseries Stood Up a New Digital Order Process in Four Weeks. Tulip's Double H Case Study.

Interview 13.3

Industrial Supply Chain Optimization. Episode 68. Interview with Professor Yossi Sheffi, Director, MIT Center for Transportation & Logistics. Augmented podcast.

Interview 13.4

Business Beyond Buzzwords. Episode 42. Interview with Jeff Immelt, Venture Partner, NEA, Former CEO of General Electric. Augmented podcast.

Figure 13.1

The Augmented Supply Chain.

Figure 14.1

Managing the Evolving Physical Configuration of the Industrial Workforce Is a Persistent (Augmentation) Challenge.

Resource 14.1

The Augmented Podcast.

LIST OF TABLES

Table 1.1

From Automation to Regeneration

Table 5.1

A Juxtaposition of Classic Lean, Digital Lean, and Augmented Lean

Table 6.1

Broad Typology of Lighthouses

Table 6.2

Critical Capabilities of a Frontline Operations Platform

Table 6.3

The Emerging Manufacturing Tech Stack

Table 6.4

Typology of Industrial Transformation Approaches

Table 9.1

Types of Corporate Customer Education Courses

Table 9.2

Essential Courses for the Digitally Enabled Frontline Workforce

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

To our families for giving us the time to do this book on weekends.

To our excellent and diligent executive editor, Bill Falloon at Wiley, for believing in the project from the start and for providing strategic guidance on content and marketing. To VP and publisher Shannon Vargo for her go‐ahead. To managing editor Purvi Patel for keeping us on schedule and getting us to the finish line. To publicity manager Amy Laudicano for positioning our book for success through a wide reach. To editorial assistant Samantha Wu for coordinating the practical aspects of publishing, which is no small lift.

To all our colleagues at Tulip, who constantly remind us why we are trying to transform manufacturing. Beyond Tulip's co‐founders, Rony Kubat and Pattie Maes, especially Eddy Atkins, Elise Jones, Erik Mirandette, Gilad Langer, Gillian Catrambone, Jen Dyment, John Klaess, Madilynn Angel, Mark Freedman, Olivier Néron, Rony Kubat, Roy Shilkrot, Saul Lustgarten, and Yuval Marcus, who took part in countless brainstorms, provided introductions and advice, and/or tirelessly read early drafts of the manuscript even when it had obvious shortcomings. A special thanks to talented writer, editor, and educator John Klaess, who read and commented on the entire manuscript, and to the creative team led by Elise Jones and Jon Vergara with Harshey Girish and Elaine Chung, for designing the book cover and for designing our fabulous book website and to Joshua Richard for coding it to perfection.

To Tulip's business partners, notably DMG MORI and Stanley Black & Decker, for being so generous with your time and sharing your experience with digital transformation and management challenges with us, including the status of your work to integrate Tulip deeply in your product.

To all the interviewees included in the book, namely Lena Jaentsch, Francisco Betti, Mark Freedman, Edward Atkins, Rick Bullotta, Jon Hirschtick, Marius Schmiedt, Damir Hrnjadovic, Dan Ron, Enno De Boer, Marc Nash, Çağlayan Arkan, Babi Mitra, Elisa Roth, Kel Guerin, Sarah Boisvert, John Klaess, Jon Sobel, Rony Kubat, Elisabeth Reynolds, Roy Shilkrot, Pattie Maes, Dayna Grayson, Shahin Farshchi, Robin Dechant, Jeff Immelt, Hilarie Koplow‐McAdams, Arun Kumar Bhaskara‐Baba, Andy Burton, Yossi Sheffi, William Bruey, Dave Evans, Kathryn Kelley, Brian Mathews and Kim Knickle, who also made themselves available as guests on the Augmented podcast.

To Kyle McCord with Atmosphere Press, who did a significant job as a developmental editor consultant at a crucial juncture in the book‐writing process.

To our developmental editor at Wiley, Kim Wimpsett, for her clarity and constructive criticism.

To our copy editor at Wiley, Cheryl Ferguson, for her accuracy, on‐time delivery, and knowledge of the Chicago Manual of Style.

To Pascal Bornet, Brad Feld, John Hart, Jeff Immelt, Torbjørn Netland, Klaus Schwab, Nassim Nicholas Taleb, and Christian Thoenes, who endorsed the book and found it worthy of a wide readership.

ABOUT THE AUTHORS

Natan Linder, PhD, is a pioneering entrepreneur of industrial tech, co‐founder and CEO of frontline operations platform Tulip, and co‐founder and chairman of the board of Formlabs, the pioneer and industry leader in professional desktop 3D printing. Formerly with Jerusalem Venture Partners, Samsung, Sun Microsystems, and Rethink Robotics, he aims to fuse design and engineering to create novel human experiences. He is a Forbes columnist and earned a PhD from MIT Media Lab. He is based in Cambridge, MA.

Trond Arne Undheim, PhD, is a futurist, scholar, podcaster, venture partner, nonresident Fellow at the Atlantic Council, co‐founder of Yegii, and Lead Ecosystem evangelist at Tulip. Formerly with MIT, WPP, Oracle, and the EU, he is the author of Health Tech: Rebooting Society's Software, Hardware, and Mindset (2021), Future Tech: How to Capture Value from Disruptive Industry Trends (2021), Pandemic Aftermath: How Coronavirus Changes Global Society (2020), Disruption Games: How to Thrive on Serial Failure (2020), and Leadership from Below (2009). He hosts two podcasts, Augmented and Futurized, and is a Forbes columnist. His PhD was on the future of work and artificial intelligence. He is based in Wellesley, MA.

INTRODUCTION

When Lena starts her shift at a mid‐sized manufacturing firm, a manufacturer of self‐adhesive label application systems, she often reflects about the future. Situated in Germany's Baden‐Württemberg, a leading economic region in Europe, she is often reminded that all regions should be on a continued path of opportunity. She is mobile, eagerly exploring opportunities. She earned her engineering degree in Sweden. When we speak with her, she's rapidly advancing, already with a leading role in the production of industrial labels at her firm. Yet, she is deeply committed to her factory job. She loves seeing the product come together, and enjoys the complexity of the process. She likes seeing results right away.

For now, economic life is dominated by the middle‐class. The region, home of cuckoo clocks, Black Forest gateau, and the headquarters of Porsche and Mercedes‐Benz, is a producer of high‐value‐added industrial products such as leather goods, musical instruments, medical instruments, food, agricultural produce, and hardware. Lena's employer produces labels and is instrumental in producing the labels used for the COVID‐19 vaccine. She is a young, female digital‐manufacturing advocate in a male‐dominated industry. Her thoughts will contribute to the reshaping of the region over time. Her mindset is continuous improvement, making use of novel technologies and tools, and always digitizing if she can. She is keenly aware of the huge landscape of tools, hardware, and software emerging and now available to manufacturers. And yet, she misses a community of people who think like her who she can talk to. She sees herself as a lone wolf. A lone, female wolf in the Black Forest (see Interview I.1).

Interview I.1 A Female Fighter in a Manufacturing SME. Episode 16. Interview with Lena Jaentsch, Business Development Specialist at HERMA Group. Augmented podcast.

Manufacturing industries account for 64% of global R&D spend, according to the World Bank. A great deal is spent on tech, although mostly on product development rather than process development. Emerging technologies that matter in manufacturing include AI, Augmented Reality, Robots, Sensors, and Wearables. Many white papers, books, and speeches have been written on these emerging technologies, but most are infected by hype and technological determinism. While effective rhetoric to argue more resources and attention to tech is needed, that view is not useful for long term transformation of manufacturing operations. In fact, we would argue it is counterproductive to the interests of the workforce to see things that way. As we know from history, greater distance between managers and shop floor workers is fodder for distrust, inefficiency and, at times, revolution and revolt. Instead, we offer the view that augmenting operations can happen now, with technologies we already possess.

WHO ARE THE FRONTLINE WORKERS?

Industrial frontline workers stand at the core of manufacturing. Whether on the shop floor or working in a transitory manner, they embody both the challenges and the opportunities of industrial production. According to the US Bureau of Economic Analysis (2018), manufacturing accounted for about 11% of GDP in the economy and 13.5 million people were employed full‐ or part‐time in American manufacturing (NAM 2022). According to Gartner, frontline workers make up to an estimated 2.8 billion from the global workforce (Allen 2021), although that definition includes a wide variety of professions outside the traditional scope of manufacturing and also includes service workers. A study by Emergence claims 80% of the global workforce working in industries such as construction, manufacturing, and agriculture is “deskless,” and that “little of the $300 billion that is spent on business software each year has gone to these workers” (Emergence 2018). Whichever way you slice it, representing a good chunk of the productivity in any economy, the frontline worker is always the first to be asked to step up and deliver more. This type of worker is also typically the last to leave the work shift in order to execute within an ever‐changing and increasingly complex environment. For example, faster product cycles, global supply chains, and meeting customer demands in light of competition all tend to fall on the frontline worker.

At the heart of this book is how to make operational decisions around technology. Equally important, those decisions are directly related to making decisions about humans. To be blunt: if the goal is performance improvement in all its dimensions (through sustainable digital transformation), frontline workers need first‐class tools. It is not enough to keep introducing just increasingly complex flavors of automation across the factory in order to reap short‐term productivity gains. How to empower humans to better leverage everything at their disposal? This is not an easy feat. But it starts with acknowledging that humans are essential for industrial production and will be for some time. The challenge is to make better use of each – technological and human capability – as an ensemble.

Frontline workers, knowledge workers in operational environments, do not necessarily have a desk. In fact, being deskless is almost what defines them. They may have a shared workstation, but their time there is fleeting and they don’t always have the luxury of customizing it to their needs. Even more importantly, they do not have the professional tools they should have to carry out their work, the kind of work that society depends on. These days, they may have a privately owned smartphone, but typically not yet enabled with apps that would make them execute their workday with the same efficiency as they book their hair appointments or conduct their online shopping. How can this be? This is untenable. As a society, we have to treat those who make stuff, fundamental products that we depend on, much better. Mobile technology, the internet, advanced software, cloud computing, and networks are all available at a consumer level in most societies.

If you are a decision maker at any level in any type of organization – executives, engineers, operators, policy makers – we are speaking to you. You should be more aware of how good intentions around fostering productivity, whether it be profit, efficiency, throughput, or resource maximization, hits frontline workers. In fact, frontline workers, properly enabled, should also be decision makers in their own right. For that reason, technology is not, in itself, the tool of choice. If the goal is sustainable digital transformation that adapts to technology and continues to skill humans, the best engine of work is (still) human. Even as we attempt to enhance the work process, any changes should be measurably humanistic. Forget that at your peril!

The Augmented Lean Imperative

Frontline workers are knowledge workers in operational environments, working with tacit knowledge, data, information, and machines to assemble, install, check, or repair products, and make stuff that society needs and depends on, or move parts and products around (logistics) – often with subpar digital tools (for decision‐support, process control, reporting, and feedback) – especially compared to office workers.

Finding skilled manufacturing workers is a challenge (Selko 2021). How is the workforce evolving in a period of rapid technological acceleration? When are thorny, global challenges felt by individuals on the front line? What are the challenges faced by frontline workers themselves? How do we deal with the leadership challenges? In an era of thoroughgoing workforce transformation, how do we even define frontline work?

Briefly, during the pandemic, a frontline worker was crudely understood as someone who was a service worker who was exposed to a lot of others – most stereotypically a food service worker or perhaps a firefighter. While that was a useful definition for a tiny aspect of frontline work, it is by no means exhaustive.

Frontline workers is our term for the folks on the shop floor, whether they manage a production line or are shift workers making it hum. In industrial settings, process engineers are frontline workers. They may be planners or plant operators, but their remit and responsibility is people, processes, technologies, and tools. Frontline workers are the first to bear the brunt of change. The impact of any tool, technology, or new process that is introduced to increase productivity will first be felt by frontline workers. Many times, changes are introduced without considering all the consequences. Frontline workers, whether attempting to manage the change or simply being subjected to it, are indeed in the line of fire (see Figure I.1). They are truly at the front lines, in many countries, at the mercy of whatever is going on there, although in Germany and Scandinavia there are rich traditions for worker participation through councils and unions (Logue 2019).

Figure I.1 The Frontline Workers on the Shop Floor.

For hundreds of years, industry has steadily marched toward automation. Over time, sentiment has swung between techno‐pessimism and an unchecked faith in the power of innovation to improve life. Authors have cataloged automation's role in mass layoffs, unequal regional economic development, and worker apathy and fatigue, and automation's contributions to massive productivity increases and worker safety gains. There's a perceived opposition between human labor and mechanical automation in this worldview that misses the ways that human ingenuity and automation multiply the effects of the other. When technology takes over repetitive, dull, or dangerous jobs, humans with creativity and agility are free to do different things that create even more value and make them happier. However, automation is about to be met with a powerful force for worker empowerment – augmentation. What technologies should be doing in this decade and in the time to come is to give working people superpowers, transforming frontline workers into knowledge workers. Exactly how augmentation works, and can work even better if understood at scale, is what this book is about.

Whenever a product is being made, wherever there is any kind of operational environment or physical infrastructure required to create, deliver, or sell that product, there typically is a person involved. That person is a frontline worker. The main characteristics of frontline work – as juxtaposed with office work – are that it is highly mobile, typically executed standing up or at least not at one particular desk, and involves physical manipulation of machines, equipment, and goods.

The paradigmatic form of industrial frontline work is carried out on the shop floor or in a factory. Warehouses, construction yards, transportation vehicles, ships, the shop floors within them, and even the factories themselves are currently undergoing dramatic changes in physical configuration, status, and with the role they play in work and society. As factories become inhabited by designers, engineers, and other highly trained personnel, the perception of the space, its status, and its importance in the economy starts to transform. A similar thing also occurs as frontline jobs themselves become highly specialized, tech‐intensive, and require in‐demand, custom‐trained labor. As more and more factory‐relevant work can be carried out remotely, that also changes the dynamic between workers and managers.

However, even with the influx of industrial automation, there are frontline workers involved in some parts of production. This is true even if the product is enabled by software and data: setting in motion a process, monitoring machines, or fixing problems. Frontline workers are present at various stages of conception and production along the supply chain – even managing the sales process, consumption, return, or recycling of a product.

WHAT IS AUGMENTED LEAN?

As the manufacturing industry evolves, the role of its workforce also changes. Augmented Lean is a book about getting the people/technology‐dimension right in the transition to smart manufacturing. We believe what has become known as Industry 4.0 is a misnomer. To be clear: this is NOT an Industry 4.0 book. We have enough of those! The term may have served the purpose of pointing out that industrialization is entering a new phase with more intense interaction between technologies and where factories need to change dramatically. However, as we will get to, most accounts of Industry 4.0 are technology deterministic. That means they are overly concerned with one side of the equation and miss important qualifications. Industry 4.0 overstates the role of technology, but also misunderstands its role, which is, of course, pivotal. The last few decades have not been just about fostering another industrial revolution fueled by technology. Instead, what we see is an ongoing industrial revolution to bridge the digital‐physical divide, transform frontline work toward knowledge work, and foster a renaissance in manufacturing.

The notion of “waves” of technology washing over industry so workers and factories need to adapt, is misleading. In fact, thinking in terms of waves is the wrong metaphor because changes overlap and many things remain constant. Lean production, a term coined by John Krafcik (1988), who was affiliated with the MIT International Motor Vehicle Program, has always been tied to the way lean was operationalized by Toyota over 30 years ago, and it is here to stay (with some tweaks). The core insights are valid across new generations of factory technologies. It is an operational mindset, a way to run any operation well, and it has been widely adopted for good reason.

Instead, the industrial challenge is to augment workers through means that empower them to not just make industrial products more efficiently. Taking Merriam‐Webster's dictionary, relevant synonyms of augment are amplify, boost, and build up. But what we should be trying to augment is not just the quality, speed, and power of a work process. We should simultaneously be sure we are boosting each worker's sense of worth. To do that, the technology used must be fit for the task but also fit for the person. In fact, we believe humanistic technology is the critical lynchpin for operational success.

Counterintuitively, one way to get the people‐dimension in manufacturing right is through the use of software. This is counterintuitive because technology isn’t often seen as a humanizing force. However, in the last 30 years, software developments have shifted emphasis from simply improving the efficiency of task execution to extending the capability and creativity of users. Entire job functions from marketing and sales to HR and finance have been transformed by software, cloud computing, and networks as utilities that allow business users – not IT or software development professionals – to create novel solutions to the problems they face every day. Crucially, this new breed of software is generative. It allows a user to create something, whether a process automation, component, or a user interface, that didn’t come with the license. Generative software gives control and generativity to users and fundamentally transforms the way a given job function works.

To date, these innovations have been limited to traditionally white‐collar work. And for good reason: It's hard enough to get sales and marketing software to play nicely together. Frontline work has the added complexity of occurring in the physical world, and spanning devices and machines and software from a variety of eras and communicating over a variety of protocols. No two operations are alike. No two operations are static. Very necessary adaptations are needed before software‐centric approaches can be fully deployed on the shop floor. We know, because of the work we did at MIT keeping an active dialog with industry. We then spun out core technology into the market, commercialized a frontline operations platform (called Tulip), and are now reaching industrial scale. We know this: it took us years tweaking our software to fit the most important shop floor use cases: production visibility, machine monitoring, connecting information back to systems of record, Andon lights, and, most importantly, dynamic work instructions, knowledge apps, and real‐time quality detection dashboards that directly augment the frontline worker. No worries if you do not know what all of these features mean: we will explore how to work with them throughout the book.

Broadly, the book outlines industrial tech opportunities, equips you with the vocabulary of change – on a societal and business level – and enables you to understand future developments across the industry. The book will also help you build specific skills: tap into emerging manufacturing innovations – and create some yourself. It will enable you to not only understand, but to act on change by starting to use the manufacturing augmentation toolkit, and giving you the ability to leapfrog traditionally educated engineers or operations professionals (or update your skillset). The book is also written for you, an operator in industry. If you are an executive, even better, you are learning the language of no‐code. Being fluent in no‐code is akin to speaking the “foreign language” of your employees – and mastering the secrets of productivity. We call it augmented lean (AL), a new management framework that is equally valuable for operators and executives.

The road to zero‐training‐required interfaces in industry is a long one, but we are on the journey. What won’t go away so fast is the fact that building a business process requires deductive logic, being aware of what inputs matter, which transformations would be useful, how to use data to achieve them, and what kind of output is required.

The frontrunners in industry are embarking on an era building on the lessons of lean, but beyond simple automation, making use of agile and iterative collaboration principles, and so much more than digital lean if that only means Lean + Digital “on top.” This new era of software driven manufacturing will favor manufacturers that are able to manage complexity by embracing a new breed of software‐driven manufacturing. New, adaptive technologies encourage decentralized decision making and flexible operations yet maintain the ability for manufacturing engineers, and senior management, to carry out connected problem solving. Why? Because they have access to complete real‐time data about the essential aspects of production (Mirandette 2019). Those who do so will have a sustained competitive advantage over industry laggards clinging to the twentieth‐century notion of a centrally controlled and executed operation. In our vision, frontline operations will support any shared, interoperable, functional form factor that improves human work performance.

Augmented Lean is a human‐centric framework for managing industrial operations. Welcome to the era of barebone human cognitive augmentation, where fewer special tech skills or complex gadgets are required. For sure, other skills, including the ability to interact with machines and sensors are required.

Work is neither dangerous, nor dull, nor dirty. Work might be automated, but never without meaning, metrics, and context. With plug‐and‐play components from your neighborhood electronics store and a more than average clear head you can become an augmented frontline worker whose career opportunities are promising. Subscribing to a new stack of cloud‐based software that integrates no‐code aspects, a manufacturer, regardless of size and scope, can become an innovator with very little sunk cost. An operator without a software degree can become an app developer and create lasting efficiencies. Because of the groundwork made by frontline operations platforms, simple steps you take can now bridge the cyber‐physical divide. All that's required is a learning mindset and being adaptable to change. We live in exciting times, where simplification is in sight, but where the details on how to make headway, are still complex.

HOW IS THIS BOOK ORGANIZED?

The book is structured around four parts: (I) The Evolution of Industrial Lean, (II) The Coming of Augmented Lean, (III) Engineering, Tech, and Skills, and (IV) Augmented Lean Operations.

Part I: The Evolution of Industrial Lean

This section's four chapters provide an overview of the management, techniques, and tools leaders typically have used to implement effective organizational dynamics throughout industrial transitions. The section leads into the current challenge: how to empower operators, those crucial mid‐level managers who facilitate the work of frontline workers, to transform their organizations for the better using augmented lean methods.

In Chapter 1, “The Evolution of Frontline Industrial Work,” we briefly trace the evolution from Industry 1.0 (seventeenth century), the era of mechanization, through to Industry 2.0 (eighteenth century), the era of mass production, Industry 3.0, the era of automation (twentieth century), and Industry 4.0 (twenty‐first century), the era of connectivity. We think the more apt name would be the era of augmentation, but will instead describe that phenomenon as Industry 5.0 (mid‐twenty‐first century). The beginnings of this era is already manifesting itself through cobots (in addition to robots) and other forms of man–machine systems (including most current forms of AI) that integrate the capabilities of each or complement each other.

In Chapter 2, “From Classic Lean via Agile to Digital Lean and Beyond,” we consider how the wildly impactful production paradigms of manufacturing are integrating the lessons of other industries' digital transformation. Today, manufacturing workers do not design the process, engineers do, and that legacy has led to alienation, especially if the process is not agile enough to pick up needs and wants. Here, the engineers design the process, but the ultimate promise is for frontline workers to own and shape more and more of their work environment, a point that the human relations school of management has hammered in, and which the best lean practitioners also appropriated – but which is still not mainstream. Agile principles derived from the software engineering process that, in turn, originate from lean methodology in the automotive sector, are making it full circle back into operations. As a result, frontline industrial workers are empowered and processes are changing for the better.

In Chapter 3, “The State of Play in Industrial Tech Software,” we track how the 1960s with industrial control systems gained industrial adoption throughout the 1970s, the 1980s brought the digitalization of engineering design (in 2D) as well as powerful visualization tools, and by the 1990s, the internet platform brought remote control systems as well as next generation design tools in 3D. The late 2000s brought the first manufacturing execution systems and throughout the decade and beyond, a plethora of such systems had emerged and their functionality (and integration cost) had ballooned. However, legacy systems didn’t go away and are still present in today's factory floor control rooms. The gradual advancement and adoption of cloud computing is a key shared component across industry and government. Many think it will become a new utility. So far, cloud computing is poorly understood among policy makers and is not properly regulated. Once it is, one would hope that it would become a truly shared resource where migration on or off private or public clouds could happen in an interoperable manner.

In Chapter 4, “The Journey Past Digital Lean,” we reflect on the fact that empowering industrial work will not happen by itself. Rather, it is a journey with explicit actions needed by workers, management, and the organization as a whole. New, lightweight technology to complement humans better than legacy systems is also part of what makes this possible. Digital transformation is seldom a painless process. As much as the technologies allow for innovation, they also challenge the production process and the leadership principles of control that used to prevail. Adding to that, in a regulated environment, digital processes must be standardized to a fault, must be traceable, secure, and provably reliable.

At Tulip Interfaces, an industrial tech startup, we have experienced what it means to take much larger companies through a deep digital lean journey, both challenging notions of what it means to make improvements, but also witnessing how shockingly easy some parts of the process might turn out to be.

Part II: The Coming of Augmented Lean

This section's three chapters describe the emergence of a new management framework in industry. The approach builds on bottom‐up reskilling and digital transformation efforts. These efforts are enhanced by no‐code platforms: enabling the technology interface to stay in the background; letting operators shine as facilitators; and fostering frontline worker empowerment across the organization. We try to show how augmentation replaces automation, and interpretable data replaces big data once we shift to an augmented lean management approach built on a humanistic approach to technology where reskilling needs are minimized.

In Chapter 5, “The Augmented Lean Framework,” we for the first time, present what's next, after the transitory ways that “post‐lean” or “digital lean” approaches have been implemented in the manufacturing industry. Our distilled framework, augmented lean, aims to clearly communicate how the company we work for, Tulip, has learned and appropriated a humanistic approach to technology and adapted it to manufacturing. The result is a novel approach to implementing industrial tech for maximum value that is inclusive, scalable, and still aligned with the constraints of a physical environment for the entirety of human workers who are not “blessed” with a desk (or an office). One might soon be able to say that the desk was hardly an ideal workplace compared to the emerging cadre of augmented industrial frontline workers.

These workers are transient, mobile, yet still deeply in need of advanced knowledge worker capabilities, both at individual, organizational, and supply chain levels, throughout their workday, and increasingly 24/7 when other shifts are complementing work and need to carry it out with the same precision.

The ever‐simpler production enhancement techniques and tracking systems ensure less alienation, better use interfaces, and greater work satisfaction. We think of it as a framework of a few elements that include a set of human traits (a hacking mentality), organizational enablement (tools, techniques, technologies), a leadership mindset (augment, decentralize, and empower – led from below), and systemic awareness (understanding – and respecting – all levels of the system).

This framework is not hard to understand intellectually, but it is tricky to execute because one group of people does not control all the variables. We offer practical suggestions to overcome that challenge – whether you sit at the top, the middle, or even at the frontline. In many ways, the tables are turned, and the top management will need to rely on well‐executed actions across the organization – and beyond. Up until this point, we have been focusing on describing the world of manufacturing as it is emerging, with small takeaways at the end of each chapter. In this section, starting with this chapter, we will look at how augmented frontline operations can be implemented at an organizational level.

In Chapter 6, “How to Roll Out Industrial Technology the Right Way,” we tackle the practical challenges of industrial tech innovation in a wide range of industries and settings, from life science to manufacturing, and across both discrete and continuous, process‐based workflows, which may well coexist within the same organization, or even at the same worksite. There is room for both top‐down inspiration (Lighthouses) and bottom‐up experimentation and growth (Greenhouses) in order to roll out industrial tech. Discovery of best practices, however, is only one component. Successful change needs to address inertia, deal with pilot purgatory, and avoid misuse of ROI too early.

In Chapter 7, “Democratizing Operational Technology Using the Dynamic Capabilities of the Organization,” we take a fresh look at the so‐called “IT vs. OT divide.” The informatics (IT) vs. operations tech (OT) power dynamics are intensifying as they clash or need to interoperate. Gartner's notion of the “citizen developer,” developed by Gartner analyst Ian Finley back in 2011, is rapidly becoming a reality a decade later. IT is complicated, and big enterprise systems often fail, are subject to major implementation delays, or become more expensive than planned. You never hear “success by IT,” just “death by IT.” Low‐code or no‐code as a democratizing force changes what the workforce should demand from its organization because it enables the dynamic (internal) capabilities of the firm as opposed to relying on third parties.

Part III: Engineering, Tech, and Skills

In this section's three chapters, we describe the need to foster a skillset appropriate to augmented lean. Making the industrial engineer fully digitally literate is a key component, but engineering‐like tasks need to be dispersed across the organization, too. The operational value of data will increase, but the process takes work.

In Chapter 8, “The Emergence of the Digitally Literate Industrial Engineer,” we explore how engineers are becoming increasingly digital regardless of their subfield. As systems get deployed in real contexts, software engineers are also learning industrial realities. Engineers are learning to work closer together with the huge and important part of the workforce who have “middle skills” – those in between high school and college degrees. Despite the fact that the manufacturing industry is rapidly digitizing, few industrial engineers have software as their primary or secondary expertise. Instead, they are experts on systems‐thinking, discrete manufacturing techniques, and statistical methods. Is that a problem? Will it change anytime soon? How can the industrial engineer operate fully digitized operations without being software literate?

In Chapter 9, “Training the Process Engineers of the Future,” we specifically look at training needs, requirements, and promising approaches to hyperscaling training. Training engineers must increasingly happen on the job – standing up, not sitting down. Curricula, approaches, and learning goals need to change. Training is social and community enabled. The process engineer of the future will ideally come prepared from some type of college training. Even if not, tomorrow's training is likely to take place on the job. Given the gargantuan upskilling needs of the industrial workplace, the best way to train engineers (or any employee) is through a community approach, not formal training or even apprenticeships. The chapter looks at some such approaches and documents Tulip's own experience building a community of learners based on our client needs. We also look closely at the challenges of elite universities such as MIT as well as the quite different challenges faced by huge land‐grant colleges with thousands of students per cohort or even by dispersed community colleges in the US and around the world.

In Chapter 10, “From Automation to Augmentation,” we sharpen our argument that not only is continued mindless automation shortsighted from a long‐term perspective, it is also counterproductive in the short term. Automation took care of the low‐hanging fruit. But by its very nature, simple automation solves problems by taking people out of the equation. However, at low volume, the cost to automate doesn't always make sense. The most pressing challenges manufacturing faces today cannot be solved with automation. For the remaining problems too hard for a robot to solve, you must rely on the most powerful computer on the shop floor: humans. These problems include: creative problem‐solving, teamwork, complex assembly, safety checks, and real‐world testing.

Part IV: Augmented Lean Operations

This section's three chapters spell out how C‐suite senior management, and most of all, crucial mid‐level operators, can create conditions conducive for Augmented Lean to emerge in such a way that it both benefits the bottom line and empowers the workforce. Realistically, this type of process cannot be forced, it just needs to emerge. How then, to answer the leadership question: How do I design my organization?

In Chapter 11