The Lean Odyssey
From Its Origins to Lean 5.0
The history of Lean through its trials and revolutions, from medieval workshops to factories run by algorithms.
- English edition
- From Its Origins to Lean 5.0, October 2026
Hardcover, 394 pages
ISBN 979-8-1860-9613-9 - French edition
- Des origines au Lean 5.0, 2nd edition, July 2026
Hardcover, 402 pages
ISBN 979-8-1860-7281-2
A story, not a manual
You smell the hot metal of medieval forges, you hear the pounding of Ford’s assembly lines, and you end up in factories run by algorithms.
You meet legendary figures and forgotten pioneers. Companies that took insane risks, and others that got burned believing they were applying Lean when they were only imitating it. An entire part looks its excesses in the face, because a method strong enough to transform organizations is also strong enough to damage them.
It all starts with a disagreement. A professor once told me that Lean was incompatible with new technologies. Throughout the book, I write him a few lines, the way you pick up an interrupted conversation. At the end, you decide for yourself who was right: the stubborn student or the self-assured master.
My goal is not to convince you that my view is the only valid one. It is to give you a framework to forge your own.
The journey
A prologue, 7 parts, 26 chapters and appendices to put it into practice.
The Roots
Chapters 1 to 5. From medieval guilds to the Venetian Arsenal, all the way to the manufactory.
The Founding Fathers
Chapters 6 to 10. The stopwatch, the assembly line, wars as full-scale exams.
Toyota
Chapters 11 to 15. The eye that hunts down whatever stands still, and the right to say stop.
The Contagion
Chapters 16 to 19. The hospital, the rigor of Six Sigma, the whole company, the startup.
Flow Goes Digital
Chapters 20 to 24. From the deployment pipeline to agility at scale and the augmented human.
Lean Gone Astray
3 acts. The theater of fake Lean, the system that turns against those it was meant to serve, then refocusing.
The Return
Chapters 25 and 26. The art of taking away, then Lean 5.0.
In the appendices
A panorama of Lean’s variants, a toolbox, the first 90 days of a Lean effort, 10 questions I am always asked, a glossary, a timeline and a gallery of 30 portraits.
Browse
The title page, the contents, the full prologue and the opening of chapter 25, from the English edition. All rights reserved.
