Yvon Chouinard, Lean Thinking, 5 Whys

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Many years ago, I visited the Patagonia Distribution Center in Nevada.  It was convenient because I had been living in Nevada at the time while working for Amazon.  And, as part of my ongoing education in Lean and Operations in general, a group of us would visit plants and distribution centers across America.  That visit to the Patagonia Distribution Center amazed me and gave me a sense of what a low footprint, environmentally responsible facility looks and feels like.  And, it is no surprise that Lean Thinking has its fingerprints everywhere.

The Founder’s Vision

Yvon Chouinard, the founder of Patagonia, is truly an inspiration to many of us.  He’s an accomplished entrepreneur but not only that: he’s an example of somebody that has created a business that is truly lives and is aligned to its core values, one of which is environmental stewardship and taking care of this planet, little by little everyday.

As an added benefit, it turns out he’s also a Lean Thinker ¹ and a practitioner of the Toyota Production System:

Who are some corporate leaders that you admire?

To tell you the truth, I am so out of contact with corporate America that I can’t say. I don’t hang out with businessmen and CEOs. I hang out with surfers and dirtballs. I’m completely out of it.

There are some companies out there that are doing some things like Stonyfield Farm, Ben & Jerry’s, Working Assets — you know, the usual — but then in some cases they’re owned by a huge corporation. I don’t know what they do really deep down. I don’t know whether they’re cooking the books like every other public corporation or not. I do think that Toyota as a company does the same thing we try to do by following the Socratic method, which is that you find your way to the solution of a problem by asking a lot of questions. They ask themselves the “5 whys” to reach their goals, which in my opinion builds excellence.

That’s when I decided to put the brakes on and decided to grow at a more natural rate — which basically means that only when our customers want something do we make more, but we don’t prime the pump. We don’t advertise on buses in inner cities to get gang kids to wear black down jackets. I basically want to make clothing for people who need it rather than for people who want it.

Sometime after that crisis in the early ’90s, we started an environmental-assessment program where we looked at all our processes and all our materials and fibers and dyes and asked the question: Is this toxic? Is there a better way to do it? We decided to lead an examined life as a company.

And more on the root cause analysis and Patagonia:

Most people, governments, and businesses don’t want to ask the Toyota five whys because continuing to ask follow-up questions could lead to finding the real causes of their problems (more often than not environmental), which in turn would force them to make a change or be left with feelings of guilt. And there is money to be made in endlessly working on symptoms, like starting resource wars to protect our gas-guzzling way of life rather than work on energy efficiency or working to “cure” cancer with a pill rather than address its environmental causes.

Indeed, more leaders that lead from their heart and head, not just for the sake of profits exemplify Yvon Chouinard.  We must be careful not to deify any one individual – we all have our warts and zits, as it were – but it is refreshing to see someone who has been successful being himself, going after what he feels is important in the world.  And, it sure helps to have Lean Thinking as part of how he has operated in business.

Here is a video of the Patagonia Distribution Facility, Patagonia Outlet:

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