Long before Toyota, a British mechanical engineer named Frank George Woollard built a fully functioning flow production system - and then history overlooked him. It is a missing chapter in the history of progressive management.
Originally published in 1954, Principles of Mass and Flow Production lays out Woollard's 18 basic principles of flow, drawn from his work at Morris Motors Ltd., where between 1923 and 1925 he achieved high-volume automobile engine flow production supported by pioneering automatic transfer machinery.
His ideas - cycle time, end-to-end flow from sales through suppliers, visual management, and respect for people - closely anticipate Toyota's management practices.
This 55th Anniversary Special Reprint Edition includes Woollard's rare 1925 paper Some Notes on British Methods of Continuous Production, along with a new preface, foreword, introduction, and biography by Bob Emiliani, Ph.D.,
The book also examines the likely influence of Woollard's work on Kiichiro Toyoda and the early development of Toyota's production system. This book will be of interest to progressive management practitioners and management historians.
Frank George Woollard MBE (22 September 1883 - 22 December 1957) was a British mechanical engineer who worked for nearly three decades in the British motor industry in various roles in design, production, and management. He was a pioneer in flow production, what is better known as the "Toyota Production System," but whose work has been forgotten.Woollard is regarded as one of the fathers of the British motor industry for his major contributions to flow production, progressive management practices, and industrial automation. In 1918, Woollard was awarded Member of Order of the British Empire (MBE) for his work on in improving the design and production of tank gearboxes, which had been the bottleneck in tank production during World War I. Woollard's innovative work at Morris Engines Limited, later known as Morris engines branch, beginning in 1923, enabled Morris Motors Limited to grow rapidly and achieve a commanding 34 percent domestic market share by 1930.Born in London, England, his father George was a butler and his mother Emily (Powell) was a kitchen maid, Woollard was educated at City of London School where he excelled in mathematics and science. In 1914, Woollard married Catherine Elizabeth Richards, and they gave birth to a son who died in infancy and daughter Joan Elizabeth on 20 September 1916. Miss Joan Woollard died on 30 January 2008.
Dr. Bob Emiliani has been a progressive management practitioner and researcher for over 30 years. He worked in industry for 15 years and had management responsibility in engineering, manufacturing, and supply chain management at Pratt & Whitney. Bob was part of a team responsible for implementing TPS principles and practices in both manufacturing and supply chains at Pratt & Whitney. Subsequently, he was full-time professor for 23 years. He now holds the honorary title of Professor Emeritus. Bob was the first academic to establish a research agenda focused on Lean leadership, resulting in numerous publications and varied leadership development workshops. Bob is a prolific, versatile, and award-winning writer whose publications span engineering, business, social sciences, and humanities. He has authored or co-authored 28 books and 45 peer-reviewed papers across six different disciplines (leadership, management, management history, supply chain management, higher education, and materials engineering). His work is widely recognized and he is praised for being a unique voice and a creative thinker.
