The Shingo Institute

The Shingo Purpose

Based on timeless principles, the Shingo Institute shapes cultures that drive organizational and operational excellence.

The Shingo Institute Mission

The mission of the Shingo Institute is to improve the process of improvement by conducting cutting-edge research, providing relevant education, performing insightful organizational assessment, and recognizing organizations committed to achieving sustainable world-class results.

Shingo Origins

Few individuals have contributed more to the development of total quality management (TQM), just-in-time manufacturing (JIT), and Lean manufacturing as Shigeo Shingo.

Many years before these ideas became popular in the western world, Dr. Shingo wrote about ensuring quality at the source, flowing value to customers, working with zero inventories, rapidly setting up machines through the system of “single-minutes exchange of die” (SMED), and going to the actual workplace to grasp the true situation there (“going to gemba”).

Over the course of his life, Dr. Shingo wrote and published 18 books discussing these and other topics, seven of which have been translated from Japanese into English. He also worked extensively with Toyota executives, especially Mr. Taiichi Ohno, who collaborated with Dr. Shingo to apply these concepts.

Always on the cutting edge of new ideas, Dr. Shingo envisioned collaborating with an organization to further his life’s work through research, practical-yet-rigorous education, and a program for recognizing the best in organizational excellence throughout the world.

In 1988, Dr. Shingo received an honorary doctorate of management from Utah State University in Logan, Utah, and later that year, his ambitions were realized when the Shingo Prize was organized and incorporated as part of the university.

While the Shingo Prize remains an integral part of the Shingo Institute, the scope of the Institute has expanded to include various educational offerings, a focus on research, and a growing network of Shingo Licensed Affiliates who teach the workshops around the world.