--- title: Lean AI for Teams | Lean Enterprise Institute description: Coached problem solving on your team's real work, with AI built into the method and running in your own systems. Develop the skill, don't rent it. --- [![LeanAI mark](https://tech.lean.org/hubfs/raw_assets/public/tech-lean-org/images/lean_AI_logo_wht.png) LeanAI](https://tech.lean.org/?hsLang=en) Work With Us expand\_more [groups Lean AI for Teams Team problem solving, with AI in the method. For CI and ops leaders.](https://tech.lean.org/lean-ai-for-teams?hsLang=en) [account\_tree Lean AI for Value Streams Your ideal value stream, reached one target condition at a time. For value-stream owners.](https://tech.lean.org/lean-ai-for-value-streams?hsLang=en) [Start on your own smart\_toy Lean AI Dojo Free coaching tools arrow\_outward](https://tech.lean.org/dojo?hsLang=en) [Technology leaders hub Not forward deployed. Forward developed. arrow\_forward](https://tech.lean.org/for-technology-leaders?hsLang=en) [What is Lean AI?](https://tech.lean.org/lean-ai?hsLang=en) [Journal](https://tech.lean.org/journal?hsLang=en) [lean.org arrow\_outward](https://lean.org) [Book a Discovery Session](https://tech.lean.org/book?hsLang=en) menu Work With Us expand\_more [groups Lean AI for Teams For CI and ops leaders](https://tech.lean.org/lean-ai-for-teams?hsLang=en) [account\_tree Lean AI for Value Streams For value-stream owners](https://tech.lean.org/lean-ai-for-value-streams?hsLang=en) [smart\_toy Lean AI Dojo Start on your own. Free.](https://tech.lean.org/dojo?hsLang=en) [hub For technology leaders Not forward deployed. Forward developed.](https://tech.lean.org/for-technology-leaders?hsLang=en) [What is Lean AI?](https://tech.lean.org/lean-ai?hsLang=en) [Journal](https://tech.lean.org/journal?hsLang=en) [lean.org](https://lean.org) [Book a Discovery Session](https://tech.lean.org/book?hsLang=en) groups Lean AI for Teams # Your people are already using AI. Mostly alone. Mostly on the easy stuff. And rarely in a way the rest of the team can learn from. The time saved stays in one person's day. The hard problems still wait. We change that on your real work, with your people doing it. For CI leaders, transformation offices, and work group leads Bring a team and a few real problems. We start on site, with your sponsor in the room. [Talk about your team arrow\_forward](https://tech.lean.org/book?path=team&hsLang=en) [Just you for now? Start free in the Lean AI Dojo →](https://tech.lean.org/dojo?hsLang=en) One person at a workbench with a laptop open beside a parts bin and a small machine, chin in hand, a clock on the wall. What we see on the floor ## AI without method makes more work, not less. content\_copy ### Workslop Output that looks finished and isn't. It moves downstream, and someone else pays to fix it. That's a defect passed on, with a nicer font. scatter\_plot ### Countermeasure explosion Ask AI for fixes and you get fifty plausible ones. Nobody found the root cause. The team sprays solutions and the problem comes back. bubble\_chart ### Capability islands Everyone has their own prompts and their own tricks. People get better, one at a time. With no standard work and no leader routine to surface it, spreading is a hope, not a habit. How it works ## Show, try, coach, repeat. The problem you're solving shapes the work. Some teams need to see where AI pays off in their tasks. Some need sharper problem solving on a problem that keeps coming back. Either way, your people do the work, on live problems, with a coach beside them. If you know Training Within Industry, you will recognize the method. It is the one behind Toyota's job instruction, and it has not needed replacing. ![A participant working her own problem on a laptop with a coach beside her](https://tech.lean.org/hubfs/raw_assets/public/tech-lean-org/images/mockups/coached-practice.jpg) Coached practice: your problem, your laptop, a coach beside you. 01 ### Start with discovery Ideally on site: a hackathon on your real problems, with your sponsor in the room. It is the gemba for AI capability. It shows where your team is and what's blocking them. 02 ### Coached practice Your people bring their problems; we coach them to work them well. That might be A3 problem solving, or building tools the team will use. 03 ### Develop builders We help a few early adopters get out ahead. They become mentors to the rest, and open a layer of collaboration with your technology and systems teams on real problems and customer value. 04 ### Keep it going Your early adopters coach the rest, and the standards hold. We check in and coach as needed, and step back as you take it on. What builds as you go - check\_circleYour people seeing for themselves where AI pays off most in their work. - check\_circleDevelopment targets for the challenges ahead. - check\_circlePeople solving real problems faster, to root cause. - check\_circleAI coaches and skills files running in your own systems. - check\_circleBuilders who keep going after we leave. Develop the skill. Don't rent it. Build your people's capability now ## Principles that guide our work Don't wait for the technology to land. Teach your people now, on real problems, with these principles. record\_voice\_over **AI that coaches. Not AI that does the thinking.** The coach asks the next good question. The person still does the seeing and the deciding. lock **Portable, and yours.** Coaches and skills take whatever form fits your work: editable files, an app in the workflow, an agent in your own systems. Your people know how to use them, edit them, and improve them. Your data stays where it is. target **Countermeasures tied to causes.** Not fifty AI suggestions with no link to the problem or the customer. Find the causes that matter, test countermeasures against them, and make what works standard. trending\_up **Judge it by what people can do after.** Better outcomes are a given. But if your people don't gain understanding, control, and the ability to improve the work as the technology changes, you lose the ability to adapt. Read the method ## The thinking behind the coaching ### [newspaper Prompt, Do, Check, Act Art Smalley The new PDCA. The person owns the prompt, the check, and the act. Stopping at the model's answer is plan, do, and quit.](https://www.lean.org/the-lean-post/articles/prompt-do-check-act-the-new-pdca/) ### [newspaper Tokens vs Torque Art Smalley Four types of situation, and where AI is strong, middling, or weak. Match the tool to the problem, not the other way around.](https://artsmalley.com/articles/tokens-vs-torque-4-types-of-situation) ### [newspaper Deployed or Developed Tyson Heaton A three-part series. Why renting engineers rebuilds the planning department, and what to develop in your own people instead.](https://tech.lean.org/journal/deployed-or-developed-the-purple-unicorn-problem?hsLang=en) ![Art Smalley](https://tech.lean.org/hubfs/raw_assets/public/tech-lean-org/images/team/art-smalley.png) ### Coached by Art Smalley and LEI faculty Art was one of the first Americans to work for Toyota in Japan. He built the AI coaching tools this work runs on, and he holds them to the standard of faithful lean method. [Meet the faculty arrow\_forward](https://tech.lean.org/#faculty) account\_tree Problems keep coming back because the flow itself is broken? That is a value stream question. [Lean AI for Value Streams arrow\_forward](https://tech.lean.org/lean-ai-for-value-streams?hsLang=en) groups ## Bring your team and one real problem. We'll look at the work together and tell you honestly where AI belongs, and where it doesn't. [Bring your team arrow\_forward](https://tech.lean.org/book?path=team&hsLang=en) [Start with a hackathon](https://tech.lean.org/book?path=hackathon&hsLang=en) ![LeanAI mark](https://tech.lean.org/hubfs/raw_assets/public/tech-lean-org/images/lean_AI_logo_wht.png) LeanAI Lean AI is a practice of the Lean Enterprise Institute. We build your team's capability to solve problems with AI, and we move value streams toward their ideal, one target condition at a time. [Visit lean.org arrow\_outward](https://lean.org) #### Explore [Lean AI for Teams](https://tech.lean.org/lean-ai-for-teams?hsLang=en) [Lean AI for Value Streams](https://tech.lean.org/lean-ai-for-value-streams?hsLang=en) [Lean AI Dojo](https://tech.lean.org/dojo?hsLang=en) [For technology leaders](https://tech.lean.org/for-technology-leaders?hsLang=en) [What is Lean AI?](https://tech.lean.org/lean-ai?hsLang=en) [Lean Tech & AI Journal](https://tech.lean.org/journal?hsLang=en) #### Connect [Book a Discovery Session](https://tech.lean.org/book?hsLang=en) [Contact Us](https://tech.lean.org/contact?hsLang=en) [Newsletter](https://lean.org/newsletter) © 2026 Lean Enterprise Institute, Inc. All rights reserved. [Privacy Policy](https://tech.lean.org/privacy?hsLang=en) [Contact](https://tech.lean.org/contact?hsLang=en)