Global Production at John Deere

Recently I toured a John Deere production facility in Mannheim, Germany. John Deere is an excellent company – great brand, great products, good growth and profitability. They have used Lean Management techniques for years and have been able to reduce their hierarchy levels down to four (!). Production workers work in teams without supervisors and are directly responsible for improving their key metrics.
The tour was great. It started off at their new welcome center which houses a selection of their products (from small to very large), a bit of their history and a small shop. The facility was clean, full …read more