1) The document discusses how practicing the Improvement Kata and Coaching Kata can help create a new organizational culture focused on continuous improvement, adaptation and innovation. It does this by developing new habits of thinking and problem solving through deliberate practice of the Kata routines. 2) A Kata is a routine that is practiced deliberately so it becomes a habit. The Improvement Kata models the scientific problem solving process while the Coaching Kata provides a standardized approach for managers to teach the Improvement Kata. 3) Regular practice of the Kata routines helps develop new unconscious habits and ways of thinking to replace old habits that may lead to errors or not be effective for new challenges. This allows organizations to continuously learn,

1. © Mike Rother TOYOTA KATA
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KATA CREATES CULTUREKata Creates Culture
Mobilize and focus capability in your organization
by coaching and practicing the Improvement Kata
Copyright © 2012 Mike Rother, all rights reserved
1217 Baldwin Avenue / Ann Arbor, MI 48104 USA / tel: (734) 665-5411 / mrother@umich.edu
Mike Rother
July 2012

2. © Mike Rother TOYOTA KATA
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MANAGING FOR IMPROVEMENT,
ADAPTIVENESS AND SUPERIOR RESULTS
Coaching and practicing the Improvement Kata
gives your organization an advantage
The ability to meet challenges and improve -- to learn,
adapt, grow and evolve -- is a critical 21st Century
task throughout society
“In times of change the
learners will inherit the
earth; while the learned find
themselves beautifully
equipped to deal with a
world that no longer exists”
~ Eric Hoffer

3. © Mike Rother TOYOTA KATA
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WHY HAVE CONCEPTS LIKE SYSTEMS THINKING,
LEARNING ORGANIZATION AND LEAN THINKING
NOT TAKEN HOLD?
These concepts were presented as a guide to management practice
but havenʼt achieved the hoped-for success. Why?
We can talk about an alternative management model, we can
describe it, we can prove that itʼs better and we can show examples.
But none of that is going to lead to its adoption or to change. Such
approaches are at odds with how we acquire new knowledge and
behavior. We need to focus more on building compact and clear
methods or routines that people can physically practice.
People donʼt behave a certain way because they lack information.
We behave one way or another because weʼre in a groove. Our
brainʼs neurons have repeated that groove for a while and thatʼs
become our way of thinking.
Hoping to create different behavior by trying to persuade people
doesnʼt work. What can work is deliberately practicing a different
routine -- a kata -- that over time becomes a new mental groove; a
new habit of thinking and acting.
As people and organizations become proficient in practicing a new
pattern they can adapt it to suit their own environment and style.
Thatʼs a normal process of technology transfer.

4. © Mike Rother TOYOTA KATA
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A QUICK EXPERIMENT
Take a moment... please cross your arms.
Then re-cross them the other way.
How did it feel the second time compared to the first?
For most of us the second time feels odd.
You have to consciously think about it and
be more deliberate.

5. © Mike Rother TOYOTA KATA
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Unconscious
Thinking
Deliberate
Thinking
Our brain creates habits for efficiency; to free up capacity
for when deliberate decision making is necessary.
Unconscious thinking enables you to get through the day by
taking care of routine decisions with minimum fuss.
Unconscious thinking is fast and instinctive, while deliberate
thinking is slow and intentional.
The subconscious can process billions of bits of
information per second, while our deliberate mind can only
process a few thousand per second.
OUR UNCONSCIOUS HABITS ARE FAST & POWERFUL

6. © Mike Rother TOYOTA KATA
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Habits are behaviors that have been repeated regularly and
occur unconsciously. The repeated behavior develops neural
pathways in the brain, making the behavior easier to complete.
Much of what happens in an organization is a consequence of
the habits that people in the organization have learned through
practice, whether deliberately or by happenstance.
MUCH OF WHAT WE DO IS HABITUAL
Like crossing our arms, performed almost without thinking
However, a pitfall of many habits is that the past experiences
that created them do not necessarily represent future situations

7. © Mike Rother TOYOTA KATA
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Our habits work well under many
circumstances, but in certain
cases they lead to errors known
as cognitive biases.
To navigate the world our brain
tries to create a coherent
interpretation of reality from the
inputs it receives, but it hides
from us the inferences itʼs making.
Because our unconscious
responses are automatic, hidden
from us, emotional and potentially
biased they may not always lead
us where we would like to go.
WE ALSO HAVE COGNITIVE BIAS
A tendency to draw incorrect conclusions
in certain circumstances based on
cognitive factors rather than evidence

8. © Mike Rother TOYOTA KATA
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Unconscious
Thinking
Deliberate
Practice
develops
You can rewire your thinking and habits by deliberately
(consciously) practicing a different behavior pattern.
Once the pattern youʼre practicing enters your
unconscious it gets smoother and faster and becomes
the normal, habitual way you operate.
BUT WE CAN CHANGE OUR AUTOPILOT
Humans have the power to develop new habits.
Thatʼs what the Improvement Kata & Coaching Kata are about.
You can change the culture of an organization,
and even an entire society, this way.

9. © Mike Rother TOYOTA KATA
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What would happen if you practiced
folding your arms the other way every day?
It would become normal; something
you can do without thinking about it.

10. © Mike Rother TOYOTA KATA
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DEVELOPING NEW SKILLS & MINDSET
We may have grown up thinking all skill and behavior is
innate -- that youʼre either born with it or not -- but thatʼs
not 100% correct.
Constantly
under
construction

11. © Mike Rother TOYOTA KATA
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DEVELOPING MORE EFFECTIVE HABITS
FOR IMPROVEMENT, ADAPTIVENESS
AND INNOVATION
How can we be creative and effective in dynamic conditions if we tend
to automatically apply old thinking & solutions to new situations?
The subject of the book Toyota Kata and the Improvement
Kata Handbook are the unconscious routines, known as
heuristics or rules-of-thumb, that we use for dealing with
problems and challenges.
Your teams can work iteratively, adapt, achieve goals and
meet challenges with confidence -- along uncertain paths --
when theyʼve practiced and learned a way of doing that.
The trick is to develop well-worn mental circuits not for
solutions, but for a systematic, scientific way of developing
solutions. Thatʼs what practicing the pattern of the
Improvement Kata is about.
That skill can then be applied to an endless number of
situations. Thatʼs important, because we donʼt know what
challenges are coming in the future.

12. © Mike Rother TOYOTA KATA
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WHAT IS A KATA?
A kata is a routine you practice deliberately,
so itʼs pattern becomes a habit
Through practicing, the pattern of a kata
becomes second nature - done with little
conscious attention - and readily available.
Examples include riding a bicycle, driving a
car, typing. Once youʼve learned to drive you donʼt think
much about using the carʼs controls and can focus your
attention on the situational aspects of navigating the road.

13. © Mike Rother TOYOTA KATA
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YOUR ORGANIZATIONʼS CULTURE
PERPETUATES ITSELF EVERY DAY
Managers
automatically
teach the
prevailing culture
Mindset
and
behavior
Teaches
Team or
Organizational
Culture
Routines
Habits
Rituals
Norms

14. © Mike Rother TOYOTA KATA
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KATA CREATES NEW CULTURE
What organizational
culture, mindset and
behavior do you want?
What do you want
managers to be
teaching / coaching?
Here the manager
is a coach deliberately
teaching a way of
thinking & acting
Mindset
and
behavior
TeachesAffectsPracticing
specific
new
behaviors
Team or
Organizational
Culture
Routines
Habits
Rituals
Norms
KATA
Is Used Here

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Reality is complicated. The way forward involves iteration
and experimentation, aimed at a desired condition we donʼt
know in advance exactly how we will achieve. But thatʼs OK.
The goal of practicing the Improvement Kata is to make
scientific thinking and working a habit. This makes teams
more effective and allows them direct attention and ingenuity
to the situational details that require conscious thought.
THE SKILL PATTERN (KATA) WEʼRE TRYING
TO TEACH AND LEARN
Predictable Zone Uncertainty / Learning Zone
We
want to
be here
next
Our Current
Knowledge
Threshold
u Create more alignment and focus in your organization
u Increase the ability of teams to achieve goals and
meet challenges
Obstacles
Unclear
Territory
?
?
?

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321 4
Establish the
Next Target
Condition
Target
Condition
PDCA Toward the
Target Condition
The 5
Questions
Go
and
See
PLAN
CHECK DO
ACT
C C
T C
Grasp the
Current
Condition
Understand
the
Direction
What challenge
are we striving
to meet?
A step-by-step
discovery process
between where we
are and where we
want to be next.
What pattern
do you want to
have next?
What is the
processʼs
current pattern?
THE IMPROVEMENT KATA
The Improvement Kata models the human, scientific creative
process and makes it something that's teachable and
transferrable in any organization. It has four steps.

17. © Mike Rother TOYOTA KATA
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THE IMPROVEMENT KATA
IS A META ROUTINE
Itʼs working on how you think
Every organization has work routines. The pattern
of the Improvement Kata is a different and particularly
powerful routine because itʼs a meta routine. Itʼs a "meta-
habit" that aims to change our mental operating system
so our human capabilities come to greater fruition.
To understand this separate WHAT youʼre working on from
HOW youʼre working on it. The Improvement Kata focuses
on the HOW. That is, the Improvement Kata is a content-
free pattern for how to go about improving, adapting and
innovating.
Skills are usually domain-specific. You don't learn to play
baseball by practicing soccer. But the pattern of the
Improvement Kata is a way of working toward any objective.

18. © Mike Rother TOYOTA KATA
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AND THE COACHING KATA IS A ROUTINE
FOR TEACHING THE IMPROVEMENT KATA
The Coaching Kata is a set of coaching routines to
practice in order to develop effective coaching habits.
It's a coaching pattern to help you teach the
Improvement Kata thinking pattern.
The Coaching Kata gives managers and supervisors a
standardized approach to facilitate Improvement Kata
skill development in daily work.
The coach needs to know both the Improvement Kata
and the Coaching Kata!

19. © Mike Rother TOYOTA KATA
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DELIBERATE PRACTICE
Itʼs commonplace in sports and music,
why not also in business!
Rather than trying to hold onto a sense of certainty
based on oneʼs perspective, we can derive confidence
from practicing a kata for how to work through uncertainty.
I wonder how
todayʼs game
will go?
Hank Aaron Practicing

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Coach Learner
Coaching
Kata
Improvement
Kata