Implementing the principles of Lean in home building is no easy task, but the payoffs in waste reduction and cost savings can be substantial. Here's a road map for getting started

I just finished a day in Australia, working with suppliers and trades in one-hour Lean meetings. Guess what? If not for the accent, local…

For more than 20 years, I have traveled the U.S. and Canada almost weekly. One-hundred nights or more in hotel rooms is not so much fun, but…

Hoping for something provocative to read on a long trip, I picked up a book of short essays by Kurt Vonnegut. I have always felt an unwarranted…

Builders rightly obsess about cost reduction, but there's a revolution brewing under the banner of Lean operations. On the surface, it resembles traditional value engineering, but there are crucial distinctions

An interview with Florida builder Jim Deitch on how he keeps his building operations lean

Scott Sedam reminds home builders to maintain good relationships with suppliers and trades

With a few notable exceptions, builders haven't figured out that if they create a disciplined, bulletproof building process, they'll have very few customer issues. And for those who do, they have time to deal with them

Most home builders are seeing their worst margins in 15 years. Thus builders in America now face the acid test on quality and customer satisfaction, when you can no longer afford to give away

In this column, Gary Grant — who just retired from Pulte's Minneapolis Division — imparts his lessons learned from 40 years in the industry