Blog Posts

The COE Summit is the cornerstone of the Center for Operational Excellence’s annual events calendar—a premier gathering where operational excellence thinkers and practitioners come together for three days of learning and connection. It’s a highlight not only for the COE team, but for our broader community of member companies, lean-focused organizations, and continuous improvement professionals. The 2025 theme—OpEx and the power of people—struck a powerful chord. This theme emerged from conversations with leaders seeking to understand the challenges and opportunities that come with leading and working with people in a rapidly changing world.

In a June 2025 COE webinar, data and technology leader Jim Perry explored prompt engineering, agentic AI, and the new AI skillsets for modern work. Through live and interactive demonstrations, Jim guided attendees through various prompt frameworks and techniques for leveraging AI tools more effectively. In this blog, Jim continues the conversation, tackling unanswered audience questions from the webinar Q&A.

The Center for Operational Excellence recently hosted the 12th Annual COE Summit. This year’s conference focused on the power of people and the critical connection between strong teams and strong performance. Through four engaging keynotes, 20 breakout sessions, and exclusive opportunities for hands-on learning, the COE Summit equipped participants with tools and tactics for connecting, collaborating, and reach their full potential with OpEx. In this blog, Joe Boroi—a COE Summit participant and IBM technology leader—reflects on his experience and learnings.

In a March 2025 COE webinar, Jason and Michelle Risser explored effective hoshin planning. Using real-world examples from Michelle’s business, the duo demonstrated the value of hoshin and offered strategies for asking the right questions, defining true north, and maintaining accountability. In this blog, Jason continues the conversation with a deep dive into an unanswered question from the audience Q&A: “How do you use hoshin to drive changes in associate metrics? It seems like what they’re measured on doesn’t align with strategic goals.”

The best leaders are always right, right? Wrong.  I know you know the type… they must have the last word in the conversation, they consistently assert rather than inquire, they “just know.” They “may not always be right, but they are never wrong.”