Taiichi Ohno

  Taiichi Ohno was born in Manchuria, China in 1912 and graduated from Nagoya Institute of Technology in 1932.  In 1943 Mr. Ohno joined Toyota as a production supervisor and eventually earned the name as one of the fathers of the Toyota Production System.  He wrote many books supporting the Toyota Production System some of which are: Toyota Production System: Beyond Large-Scale Production and Workplace Management.  In the late 1940's and early 1950's Toyota was facing financial struggles and needed to improve production and business processes in order to compete with other manufacturers of the time.  It was then that Mr. Taiichi Ohno and Shigeo Shingo were challenged to improve without the use of excessive capital expenditures.  Together Mr. Shingo and Mr. Ohno transformed the manufacturing world.  One of the major discoveries that Mr. Ohno came across during this stage of transformation was what became known as the 7 deadly wastes: Transportation, Inventory, Motion, Waiting, Overprocessing, Overproduction, Defects.  
  Taiichi Ohno often described the Toyota Production System as a supermarket.  Impressed by a previous trip to America Taiichi Ohno found it phenomenal how the markets operated based on the pull of the customer.  He later took this idea back to Toyota creating the early beginnings of the Just in Time System.  
  Taiichi Ohno's fame has spread over the years as almost every great sensei in some way or another can trace their lineage back to Mr.  Ohno.

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