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Joan Wellman has spent over thirty years consulting to large scale change initiatives in the aerospace, telecommunications, high technology, energy and healthcare industries. She pioneered the application of Toyota principles in healthcare in 1995. In 2010, she published, with Pat Hagan and Dr. Howard Jeffries, Leading the Lean Healthcare Journey which chronicles over a decade of healthcare improvement work at Seattle Children’s, Memorial Care, The Everett Clinic, and Children’s Hospitals and Clinics of Minnesota. Joan is a frequent speaker at national conferences, and has served as adjunct to the faculty of the University of San Francisco Graduate School. She founded Seattle-based Joan Wellman and Associates (JWA Consulting) in 2000 to bring lean consulting talent from industry to healthcare.

Larry Godt has been helping organizations through their lean transformation journey for over a decade. Most recently, Larry has consulted to Seattle Children’s Hospital, the University of Washington Medical Center, Harborview Medical Center, Children’s Hospitals and Clinics of Minnesota, and MemorialCare. Larry brings a wide range of expertise to his consulting including extensive skills as a change coach to executives as well as deep expertise in business assessment, strategic planning, policy deployment, value-chain mapping and quality improvement. Larry has conducted seminars with Industry Week, International Institute of Research, Strategic Alliance for Higher Education and the University of Washington. Prior to consulting, Larry held management positions in Engineering, Quality and Operations with both start-up and multi-national manufacturing organizations. Larry has a B.S. in Engineering from the University of Michigan and an M.B.A. from the University of Washington and is a registered professional engineer in the state of Washington.

Lainie Conley has been leading change in organizations for over fifteen years. Her expertise includes Lean process improvement, healthcare facility design, strategic planning, and internal organization training and coaching. Trained with Shingijutsu Co., Ltd, Lainie began her Lean work in manufacturing with Genie Industries and has traveled around the world studying lean operations. Her passion is team coaching, competitive collaboration, and integrating the needs of people into the change process. She has provided Lean consultation and strategic planning guidance to Swedish Medical Center, Seattle Children's Hospital, Children's Hospital and Clinics of Minnesota, Kindred Hospital, MemorialCare Health System, and Microsoft Corporation. It’s not all work: Lainie is an avid ice-climber, a certified yoga instructor and is completing a Masters degree in Organizational Psychology with Prescott College.

Teresa Deason brings over 30 years of business experience in management, marketing, project management, facilitation, training, quality improvement and lean. With a track record of delivering bottom line results, Teresa has led lean implementations for McCaw Communication enterprises, Cable Plus, Genie Industries, Jefferson Healthcare and Children’s Hospitals and Clinics of Minnesota. Her lean expertise includes implementation of lean management systems, value stream improvement, internal consultant development, training and executive and management coaching. Prior to consulting, Teresa held executive management positions in Quality, Operations and Marketing. She has a B.B.A. Degree from Texas State University.

Michael Boyer Michael Boyer brings over 28 years of business experience in engineering, management and consulting. His experience and counsel has focused on the implementation of lean principles in service of organizational performance through large system change, strategic planning and alignment, value chain management and continuous process improvement. Michael has engaged with large and small organizations in various industries that include The Boeing Company, Rockwell International, Hewlett Packard, Lockheed Martin, The US Navy, General Dynamics, PPG Industries, Northrop Grumman, Precision CastParts Corp., The US Coast Guard and Bath Iron Works. Michael has led seminars for Industry Week, AME, National Manufacturing Week, NSRP, and The University of Kentucky. Prior to consulting, Michael held senior positions in operations, engineering, strategic planning, quality, human resources and finance. Michael holds a BS in Industrial Engineering, an MBA in Engineering Management, and a PhD in Organizational Management. His healthcare clients include MemorialCare Medical Centers, The Everett Clinic, Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia, Children’s Hospitals and Clinics of Minnesota, Kadlec Health System, Lucile Packard Children’s Hospital at Stanford, and Seattle Children’s Hospital.

Mary Ellen Walton has over 25 years experience in the field of business management, predominately working with consulting firms dedicated to the implementation of lean principles. Her management career began in Washington D.C. while working for the National Cattlemen’s Association, followed by employment with McKinsey & Company in Atlanta, Georgia. Mary Ellen began working with Joan Wellman in 1987 as part of the Deltapoint Corporation. Mary Ellen is currently the Operations Manager for Joan Wellman & Associates, Inc. She has an Associates Degree in Business Management from Chesapeake College in Maryland.

Lisa Williams has guided healthcare organizations through their unique challenges for over 15 years. Her successes include hospital and long-term care administration, organizational change, process improvement, survey preparedness, program development, quality improvement, and regulatory compliance. Lisa has taught management communications, research methods & statistics, and organizational theory & behavior at the college level. She also served on a governor-appointed state board providing regulatory oversight to nursing home administrators. Prior to her consulting career, Lisa served as the Hospital Administrator for Group Health Cooperative’s two-hospital system and East King County Project Director, the Assistant Administrator of the University of Mississippi Medical Center, and Administrator at Jaquith Nursing Home. She has also worked with Overlake Hospital Medical Center, Group Health Permanente, Providence Health System, the Mississippi Department of Mental Health, The Joint Commission, Children’s Hospitals & Clinics of Minnesota, MemorialCare Health System, The Everett Clinic, University of Washington, and Texas Tech University. Lisa holds a Masters in Public Policy and Administration, Nursing Home Administrator License, Bachelors in Business Administration, and Graduate of the John C. Stennis Institute for Government Executives.

Kitty Searles has a background in business administration and management for over 20 years. She formerly held positions of Publishing Manager at The Deltapoint Corporation, a management consulting firm specializing in improvement methodologies and lean implementation, and Training Administrator with The Boeing Company, providing administrative coordination and management of training workshops for SPEEA-represented employees. She has served as group/meeting facilitator for Boeing’s Ed Wells Partnership strategy development and process improvement teams, and an Engineering New Hire Orientation facilitator for Boeing Commercial Airplanes. Kitty is currently the Training Manager for Joan Wellman & Associates, Inc.

Mike Bresko has over 30 years of international business and consulting experience, the past 25 of which have focused on guiding or managing business transformations. His specialties include lean management systems, lean transformations, six sigma, Training Within Industry (TWI), and product and service innovation. Mike's client list includes John C. Lincoln Health Network, Cigna, MicroSurgical Technology, Boeing, the aerospace supply chain, Verigy, Agilent, the U.S. Army, Rolls-Royce, Ford, Mercedes, and automotive Tier 1 suppliers. Mike has conducted seminars for Shingo Prize, Association for Manufacturing Excellence, Noria Lean for Reliability, American Society of Quality, and National Association of Purchasing Managers; has authored 14 articles on lean transformations; and contributed to the book, Driving Operational Excellence. Prior to starting consulting 14 years ago, Mike was President of Alcoa-Zepf and Global Manager Alcoa Packaging Equipment. Mike holds a BS and MS in Engineering from Carnegie-Mellon University and an MBA from the University of Pittsburgh. He is a Lean Six Sigma Master Black Belt.

Chris Fosse has been a student and practitioner of lean and quality improvement since 1980, and has held senior positions at two international Fortune 500 corporations. Earlier in his career, he worked in design engineering, manufacturing engineering, plant start-up, marketing, and as a plant manager. He worked on some of the first JIT (lean) projects at Omark Industries, and as Director of Quality and JIT Systems had the opportunity to work directly with Shigeo Shingo (Toyota Production System) for three years and Dr. Noriaki Kano (Total Quality) for 10 years. He helped build the management system, was responsible for the Hoshin Planning process, and started training teams in QFD and QI Story problem-solving (A3) in 1984. He was a loaned executive to FPL during the Deming Prize challenge; and was appointed a Baldrige examiner in the first years of the award. After Blount, Inc. acquired Omark, he was appointed corporate Vice President of Total Quality. In 1992, he joined Deltapoint consulting, where he developed the “Kaizen Blitz” as a way to involve people to rapidly “learn by doing” and experience improvement. Most recently, he was Vice President, Terex Business System for the Terex Corporation, providing support for process improvement across 50 major sites. Chris holds a B.S. in Mechanical Engineering from the University of Colorado and an MBA from McGill University in Montreal.

Aaron Kim has been leading Lean implementation in various organizations since 2002.  He began his formal Lean training under Michael Boyer and Jim LoPresti while participating in the National Shipbuilding Research Program’s Lean implementation initiative at Atlantic Marine.  Throughout the program Aaron gained invaluable experience in Kaizen event facilitation, model line deployment as well as Lean shipbuilding best practices from South Korea and Japan.  In 2004 Aaron introduced and spearheaded Lean implementation at Standard Register, a leading documents and forms manufacturer.  He is currently leading a large system change at Cambridge International, the world’s largest metal conveyor belts manufacturer.  Aaron is a certified Lean Six Sigma Black Belt and has released over 30 popular educational Lean videos on the internet.  He holds a BS in Industrial and Systems Engineering from the Georgia Institute of Technology and an MS in Engineering Management from the University of South Florida.

Colin Fox, Jr. first visited a Toyota plant in Japan in 1982 and hardly understood what he saw. After co-founding a management consulting firm, he subsequently led over 40 study missions to Japan. He is well versed in the Toyota system approaches to achieving high quality, low cost, fast delivery, and accident free outcomes. In 1997, he was asked to join Genie Industries as VP of Operations where over a period of seven years implemented Genie's version of a lean system. Then in 2004 he became Senior Vice President of the Terex Corporation reporting to the CEO and responsible for implementation of a customer-centered lean system across five continents and over 45 locations. He officially retired in January, 2010. He has a PhD in management and has taught at the University of Oregon and at UCLA.

Gordon Harter has been consulting and leading lean change initiatives for over 20 years. He has consulted in pharmaceuticals, aerospace, hospitality, telecommunications, wood and rail products, with clients such as SmithKline Beecham, The Boeing Company, Milliken & Company, Hilton Hotels, USWest New Vector, Boise Cascade, ABC Rail, Menasco Aerospace, and Avio Interiors. He has worked with organizations in a variety of life cycle phases from early start-ups to Fortune 100 companies. Gordon’s expertise includes all lean methodologies, strategic planning and deployment, daily management, and performance measurement. Gordon is a frequent speaker on lean implementation and has conducted seminars for the Association for Manufacturing Excellence (AME). Prior to consulting, Gordon held executive positions in e-commerce, software and hardware development and management positions in Industrial Engineering and Quality Management. Gordon has a B.A. in Business Administration from Northwest Nazarene University, and graduate work at Seattle Pacific University.

Karl M. Hoover has been leading change in healthcare for over 31 years bringing extensive experience and success to his consulting including expertise in project management, information technology, enterprise quality strategies, strategy development and deployment, and creating organizational transformation through the implementation of lean based management systems. For the last several years, Karl served as a strategy consultant for Group Health Cooperative in Seattle WA, working directly with the CEO and the executive leadership team in creating and implementing the Group Health lean management system across the corporation. His lean expertise includes development and implementation of comprehension lean management systems, training, facilitation, internal consultant development and executive and management coaching. Karl holds a Bachelor of Science in Psychology and a Master's in Audiology, both from Washington State University.

Patrick Hagan joined Seattle Children’s in May 1996 and currently serves as its President and Chief Operating Officer. Over the past 25 years he has held executive positions at children’s hospitals in Ohio and Arizona, in addition to Seattle. Learning from Joan Wellman (of Joan Wellman and Associates) and the experiences of Toyota, Boeing, Genie, and other companies utilizing continuous improvement principles and tools, Pat has led and helped develop the CPI (Continuous Performance Improvement) strategy at Seattle Children’s. His leadership has resulted in improving performance in service quality, clinical access, patient safety, staff engagement, and financial results. Pat has sponsored, led, or participated in several Rapid Process Improvement Workshops, and teaches Children’s week-long CPI Leader Training course. Over the past several years Pat has spoken at numerous conferences and institutions about CPI and Seattle Children’s successful application of this transformative strategy.

Darin Aaby has been a practitioner of lean practices and consultant on lean transformation for the last fifteen years. Previously, he was Senior Lean Sensei of the World Wide Amazon Customer Excellence Systems (their lean group). As the Sr. Lean Transformation Coach at Amazon, he and his team of lean experts were responsible for complete lean conversions of their worldwide operations. Prior to Amazon, Darin had positions of increasing responsibility at Genie’s highest volume plant, Lean Operations Director and Lean Transformation Consultant for Terex plants worldwide. Darin has extensive knowledge and demonstrated experience in transforming operations with results such as increasing net profit by 5X in a Genie plant, using Toyota 3P methods to rapidly design and implement revolutionary lines at Genie’s Moose facility and implementing inventory reduction processes to reduce working capital from 55 million to 10 million dollars in a Terex Corporation plant. Darin has studied at Toyota domestically and in Japan and his transformed operations have appeared on the cover of the Association of Manufacturing Excellence Magazine in recognition of the advances that were made. He holds a BS and MS in Mechanical Engineering.

Missy White joins JWA with 25+ years of leadership skills development, strategic planning, meeting facilitation, and mediation. She has worked with private sector entities, non-profits, and government agencies. Clients include: John C. Lincoln hospitals, Google, RealNetworks, Global Adrenaline, NASA Astronaut Corps, Lummi Youth Academy, WY Department of Education, Building Goodness Foundation, and facilitating in the Wharton Executive Education program. Missy is drawn to lean because it is an excellent partnership of tactical and adaptive skills, and she appreciates the systemic and systematic improvements generated through 5S, RPI, and other lean methods. Applying lean in healthcare is compelling and rewarding work. Missy received a BA from Davidson College and an MA in Organization Systems Renewal from Seattle University. She is an avid knitter and gardener, and participates in endurance athletics in varying forms, including skiing across Yellowstone National Park in a single day.

Rick Hartman has 16 years of experience in “Lean” and during the past 12 years has implemented Lean Transformations for clients in the manufacturing and service industries. His work has included organization restructuring, plant consolidation, product and service rationalization, and outsourcing, as well as the traditional Kaizen projects, including development of continuous flow systems, cycle time reduction, productivity improvements, inventory reductions and Value Analysis/Value Engineering design improvements. These efforts have saved clients over $400M in savings. Through these experiences, Rick has helped develop new analysis and implementation tools and methodologies that have increased the speed and effectiveness of Lean Transformations. He is recognized as a "Lean Sensei" and excels at training and mentoring new Lean Leaders and Lean Managers. Some of the clients Rick has worked with are Agco Tractor, APL Logistics, Bendix, Canadian Pacific Railway, Case New Holland, Coca-Cola, Dana, John Deere, Sika, Smith Services, Solvay, Thorn Lighting, TridonicAtco, Visteon, and more recently Nemours and Vancouver Children’s and Women’s Hospital. Prior to his consulting experience, Rick enjoyed a 20-year career at The Boeing Company in operations management. At Boeing he was trained and certified in Lean and was recognized for his leadership by leading the 737 engine moving assembly line project. Rick has a BS in Business Administration from City University, Bellevue, WA.

Tom Robinson has over 22 years of experience in analyzing processes, coaching and developing managers, facilitating high-performing teams, and teaching methods for improving quality and customer service. Tom has consulted to a wide range of organizations including Boeing, BP Exploration Alaska, Getty Images, Harborview Medical Center, HIV Vaccine Trials Network, Lummi Indian Nation, Philips Oral Healthcare, Qualis Health, Swedish Medical Center, Texas Tech Student Health Center, UW Department of Surgery, Virginia Mason Medical Center, and Watermark Credit Union. During his career Tom has also held positions as chief administrative officer, a human resources development manager, a college professor, and an outdoor guide instructor and course director for Outward Bound, and core faculty for Seattle University’s Master’s program in Organization Systems Renewal. Tom received his Ph.D. from Stanford University and his B.A. from Prescott College.