Lean AI

You've deployed the tools. You've run the pilots. Now build the capability.

Lean AI is using AI to build human capability to solve problems at speed, and to accelerate lean transformation. It is judged on both.

groups Build your team's problem-solving capability arrow_forward Coached work on your real problems, with AI built into how your team solves them. account_tree Take a value stream toward its ideal arrow_forward Your work transformed, one target condition at a time. smart_toy Rather start on your own? Try the free Lean AI Dojo. arrow_outward

Ways to start

Four ways in. Each one works on your real problems.

Start where you are. Each step builds the capability for the next one.

On your own · Free to start “My people are new to AI.” smart_toy Lean AI Dojo Practice tools built by Art Smalley. Bring a real problem and put in the reps. The Lean Prompting Field Guide is coming soon. You leave with The basics, on your own real work Enter the Dojo arrow_forward Live sessions “We want one shared method.” school Lean AI Workshops Coached practice with Art Smalley and Tyson Heaton, using AI as a thinking partner, with Dojo reps between sessions. You leave with A shared method and language for AI in problem solving Talk about your team arrow_forward 1 to 3 months “We have a known problem.” construction Burst Builds One tightly scoped problem, built inside your own tools. Your people do the building. We coach on call. You leave with A solved problem and a standard to reuse elsewhere Talk about a build arrow_forward Most capability built Multi-visit “The flow itself is the problem.” account_tree Lean AI for Value Streams Lean AI coaches work beside your leaders and the people who do the work to transform one end-to-end workflow, often one slice of a larger value stream. You leave with The work changed, results improved, and a team that can run the next one Talk about a value stream arrow_forward

explore Not sure where you stand? A hackathon on your own work shows you. One to two days, with your sponsor in the room. Start with a hackathon arrow_forward

Everyone's saving time. Nothing's getting faster.

The wins are real, but local. The draft takes minutes. The decision takes days. Saved time lands in pockets, the bottleneck moves, and the metrics barely budge.

8 in 10

say AI made them more productive. Fewer than 4 in 10 see any of it in earnings.

McKinsey, The State of AI in 2026: On the Road to ROI

2 in 3

frontline AI users get little or no guidance on what to do with the time they save.

BCG, AI at Work: Why Strategy Matters More Than Tools, 2026

About 40%

of the time AI saves goes back into fixing what it produced.

Workday, Beyond Productivity: Measuring the Real Value of AI, 2026

Three places we keep seeing AI efforts stall

There are plenty of ways to get stuck. These are the ones we run into most, and each looks like progress while it happens. Open one to see why.

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Activity over outcomes

Copilot for everyone. Usage up. Results flat.

See why

Why it fails

AI went out like any other software. People used it. Nobody changed how the work gets done.

The tokens got spent. The capability stayed flat.

science

Pilots that never finish

A central team. Strong demos. Nothing in production.

See why

Why it fails

The technology changed. How people worked and how leaders led did not. Technology × behavior × management = impact, and anything times zero is zero.

A pilot proves the tool. It doesn't change the work.

work

Renting the builders

Outside experts build your AI tools for you.

See why

Why it fails

The AI works until something shifts: the model, the data, the work. Then you call the builders back, and many have moved on.

If your people can't shift with the models, you don't really own the tools.

The equation is Art Smalley's: "Technology × Behavior × Management = Impact"

What we mean by Lean AI

Build your people's capability now. Change the process with care.

Both have to move together: your people get better at solving problems, and the work itself gets better.

Teach your people now, on real problems, and they become the ones who help decide how AI comes into the work.

Capability develops through doing. People change how they think when they do real work differently and reflect on the results. That is why your people do the work and we coach. It stays when we leave.

Read the principles arrow_forward

Art Smalley coaching a participant through a problem, laptop open between them — Art Smalley, coaching a participant through a problem with AI at a Lean AI session.

How we work with you

The faculty who built the coaching tools are the ones on the floor with your team.

A Lean AI hackathon room: teams at tables with laptops, a coach working with one table, flipcharts behind

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Tyson Heaton

Org Strategy

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Art Smalley

Problem Solving

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Steve Pereira

Flow Engineering

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Sandrine Olivencia

Lean Product

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Fabrice Bernhard

Scaling Lean

We carry the intellectual heritage of the Lean Enterprise Institute, and hands-on experience putting AI to work in operations.

warning What we're direct about

We won't help you automate a broken process. If the work underneath is unstable, AI makes the mess faster and harder to see. We'll say so, and fix the work with you as the technology goes in.

Problems will surface. When the work gets visible, problems that were hiding show up. That's the point, and it can be uncomfortable.

We challenge assumptions. Our job is to help you see reality clearly, not to validate what you already believe.

We'll ask what happens to the time you free up. Saved hours that nobody plans for either vanish or turn into layoffs. Plan for them, and people learn it's safe to improve their own work.

Start on your own