Workshop: Introduction Toyota Kata Introduction to Toyota Kata Toyota Kata is the title of a book written by Mike Rother in 2009. This book has had a profound effect on the lean community. It shifted the attention from the technicalities of lean processes to the way Toyota thinks and acts to achieve these lean processes. Background In the book Toyota Kata Mike Rother describes two routines: the improvement kata and the coa- ching kata. The thinking and acting patterns that these routines represent are practiced throughout Toyota to create the organizational capability to address ever bigger challenges. About the workshop In this workshop we will give you: An introduction to Toyota Kata. An Interactive presentation to introduce Toyota Kata (Emiel) 45 min A presentation of a kata practitioner (Mystery guest ;-) 45 min Kata in the Classroom Exercise 90 min Kata in the classroom The Kata in the Classroom Exercise is designed by Mike Rother to introduce kata thinking to kids. It is also an excellent exercise to introduce the topic to management teams. All material and instructions are available for free www.katatogrow.com. Current languages avai- lable are Dutch, English German, Italian and Swedish. So, after this workshop you are ready to pick up the material yourself and teach it to children; students and colleagues. Emiel van Est In 1997 Emiel started improving and designing processes for Hewlett Packard and has since then helped a diverse group of clients in many different industries with their Lean efforts. He also introduced Lean to many people by engaging them in simulations like the one that he co-developed with Scania. Emiel taught many classes for Scania in the Ne- therlands and has taught in Sweden as well. Since 2010 Emiel has concentrated his learning, teaching and practice on the deployment of “Toyota Kata” as described in the book of Mike Rother. His area of focus became connecting top and bottom, aligning higher objectives and trans- lating these to the diverse teams. He found that the improvement kata and Hoshin Kanri (Policy Deployment) combine really well.