Looking for a Japan study tour that goes beyond factory visits?
The Japan Leadership Experience led by Katie Anderson is an immersive lean leadership tour and Japan learning mission that helps leaders understand the Toyota Production System, kaizen, Japanese management, and people-centered leadership through firsthand experiences with organizations across Japan.
Over 160 leaders from more than 20 countries have participated in this transformational leadership development experience as of the writing of this post.
Who joins a Leadership Learning Program in Japan?
While every leader who joins this program shares the common desire to go to the birthplace of the Toyota Production System to see firsthand what makes Japanese companies the best in the world, each participant has their own reasons for wanting this experience and what they plan to do with what they discover when they return home.
Deepen Your Lean Leadership Expertise in Japan
External consultants — come to deepen their mastery and create a competitive advantage. Some come as individuals, and others bring their clients to strengthen relationships, accelerate impact, and drive results together.
Develop Your Leadership Teams through a Japan Learning Mission
Operations executives and intact executive teams, including C-suite leaders, come wanting to learn and grow together on what it takes to create and implement a high-performance, people-centered learning organization.
Transform from Lean Practitioner to People-Centered Leader
Internal improvement practitioners come ready to get away from being transactional project doers and transform into influential change leaders and coaches.
Join me on the next cohort of the Japan Leadership Experience.
Experience Real People First Leadership
You’ll learn the essence of respect for people and hold precious what it means to be human — something you just can’t get from reading a book or sitting in a classroom.
As one healthcare COO told me, the experience in Japan dropped his understanding “from the head to the heart.”
You can join the Japan Leadership Experience on your own, with your clients, or as a team, and use the experience to catalyze the change you want to create for your leadership, career, and organization.
I’ve been leading this immersive lean leadership tour since 2018, and what I love most about each one is bringing together an incredible and unique group of people for shared learning, professional development, and collaboration that lasts beyond the week in Japan.
This article is designed to give you an insight into my Japan Leadership Experience and show you a snapshot of what each day brings, not just experiencing Japanese culture, Japanese management, and continuous improvement — but what key themes and learning concepts bring to the participants.
Japan Leadership Experience Cohort 9 May 2026 Agenda:
- Day 1 — Toyota Commemorative Museum of Technology and Innovation, and Orientation
- Day 2 — Mifune Factory Visit, Tea Ceremony, Group Reflection
- Day 3 — Avex Factory Visit, Tsuda Elementary School Visit, Presentations with Isao Yoshino and Daiki Kato
- Day 4 — Ina Foods / KantenPapa Visit, Sake Tasting, Ryokan Experience
- Day 5 — Daruma Temple, Zen Meditation, Kura Sushi, Tokyo Food Visit
- Day 6 — Leadership Presentations, Final Discussions, Graduation
Day 1 – Toyota Museum and Orientation
Learning, connection and transformation
While this was “Day 1” of our week in Japan, it wasn’t the first day of our learning journey together. That began months ago with our first pre-trip calls to come together as a cohort and to prepare our minds, hearts, and spirits for these immersive six days together.
I was happy to have 40-year Toyota leader Isao Yoshino – now 82 years old – joining us for the whole week. He was thrilled with the gifts from the Shingo Institute that I brought with me from the Shingo Connect conference recently.
The learning journey always begins with personal purpose and intentions during our orientation session.
We start the learning at the Toyota Commemorative Museum of Industry and Technology by going back in history to the origins of the Toyota Production System as an innovative start up — a loom company seeking to solve the problems of the mother’s founder: broken threads causing rework.
I put a lot of intention into the structure of the learning program and the facilitation plan, yet of the richest insights during the Japan Leadership Experience from the discussions in the spaces between. At meals, in elevators, walking together.
This is the beauty of an immersive time together. Structured and unstructured learning – with a group of global leaders.
Day 2 – Mifune Visit and Tea Ceremony
“Doing Great Things Together”
What a beautiful reflection uniting the theme across the day of two seemingly opposite experiences.
First — technical and leadership insights of TPS from walking the loud shop floor of a metal welding and stamping Toyota Tier II supplier with Chairman Umemura.
Second — the quiet grace and Omotenashi of a transitional Japanese tea ceremony in a Buddhist temple.
One loud, the other quiet. Yet both are essentially about how to do great things together.
- How to create space so others can step forward.
- Embracing learning through doing and the growth that comes through development and practice.
- A focus on personal excellence and responsibility for quality
- The leader’s smile and human connection creates confidence
I love the richness of learning that comes from sharing these experiences with each new cohort.
“Ichigo Ichie” — meaning: one meeting, one time. In essence it means that together our experience will never be repeated, even in the same context.
New learning happens with each meeting, a few of my participants have experienced this for themselves — a reason that many have attended my Japan Leadership Experience multiple times.
Day 3 – Avex Visit, School Visit, Isao Yoshino and Daiki Kato Presentations
“Cherish”
The key theme that came from our reflection session on day 3 sum up the essence of our experience. From visiting a high precision metal manufacturing company to eating lunch with Japanese elementary school children to presentations led by Toyota leader Isao Yoshino, me, and Professor Daiki KATO — we were immersed in Japanese culture and people-centered leadership.
School’s precepts:
- Cherish dreams, Develop friendships, Have conviction
- Create a space of belonging. Long term investment and vision.
- People are treasures, not a cost
- High expectations, high relationship
- Permanence of purpose, innovate and change what you create or deliver
- Aim to be #1 in your area
- Embrace failure and mistakes as a source of learning and growth
- New isn’t necessarily better
- Collective ownership is usually better than individual directives
It all starts with the leader. The leaders set the tone and the culture.
I captured the conversation with Mr. Yoshino – and it will be featured in a bonus episode of Chain of Learning!
What a special gift for these participants to get to not only hear from him but to enjoy meals and casual conversation together.
This is where the real learning happens.
The capstone of tonight — dinner at the local fish market. (This is always one of my favorites meals of the week.)
Day 4 – Ina Foods, Sake Brewery, Ryokan
Essence and happiness
Ina Foods is a company that has spent decades sustaining a company culture founded on people, community, long-term responsibility, and what it really means to create an environment where people can grow and do their best work.
Their purpose is simple and profound: happiness.
Not as branding.
Not as a slogan.
But something you can actually feel.
That’s what leaders experience when we visit during my Japan Leadership Experience — and this is a company you won’t visit on any other program.
Seeing what this looks like in reality shifts how you think about leadership. Suddenly “respect for people” stops being conceptual and you start to see how the environment shapes behavior.
This is one of the many reasons I love bringing leaders to Japan. Not just to learn new ideas, but to experience what those ideas actually look and feel like in practice.
Experiencing this in person allows the concepts to drop from the head to the heart.
A special highlight of this visit – Ina Foods hired a professional video team to record our insights and experience. I even got interviewed to be featured in an internal company highlights reel!
Day 5 – Daruma Temple and Tokyo Foods
Reflection, purpose, and omotenashi (hospitality)
Clear the mind to open the heart. It can be challenging, but rewarding, to take the space to get grounded and clear of mind.
We then open ourselves to kaizen and greater intention, wisdom, and connectedness. As the head priest told me once (which I talked about on a Chain of Learning podcast episode): “Remove the muda to reveal the Buddha”
This zen meditation practice is now an integral part of the Japan Leadership Experience because it opens us to deeper learning and more meaningful reflection.
If you’ve followed me for any time, you know my obsession with the Daruma doll. So visiting the “daruma temple” is a must on my program! Daruma dolls represent the Japanese proverb “fall down seven times, get up eight” — reminding us of the patience and persistence it takes to achieve a goal.
Leaders fill in the left eye when setting a goal and the right eye when the goal is achieved — a visual reminder of commitment and resilience.
We then visited Tokyo Foods to experience their energetic chorei – start-up meeting – and connect with personal purpose. (Check out the video below!)
At Tokyo Foods, we also used a simple problem-solving practice that the company has been using for frontline improvement: KPT — Keep, Problem, Try.
What should we keep doing?
Where are we bumping into problems?
What should we try next?
It’s a simple but powerful reflection practice.
Helping teams turn obstacles into experiments and build the routines of success that improve a little every day.
Sometimes the most meaningful learning happens in moments like this while working side by side and reflecting on what the process is teaching us.
Day 6 – Graduation
“Cherish. Connect. Create.”
Day 6 wrapped up cohort 9 of my Japan Leadership Experience. Another incredible week with a sold-out program of 18 global leaders all seeking better ways to lead, learn, and live.
Every cohort brings new learnings and insights – from returning to the same companies I’ve visited countless times over 11 years and seeing how they hold constancy of purpose and mission yet continually practice kaizen to innovate into the future.
To the unique perspectives and questions each group of global leaders bring — from the C-Suite to value creation work — about how each of us can change ourselves for the better and impact positive change with those around us.
Join Katie Anderson’s Japan Leadership Experience!
The Japan Leadership Experience, led by Katie Anderson, is much more than a study trip or lean tour.
It’s an opportunity to step away from the demands of daily work and immerse yourself in a comprehensive learning experience designed to deepen your understanding of what it really takes to create a culture of learning, continuous improvement, and performance excellence.
Together with former Toyota leader Isao Yoshino, Japan-based lean expert Tim Wolput, and a global cohort of leaders, you’ll experience firsthand how organizations create the conditions for people to learn, thrive, contribute, and continuously improve.
You’ll visit organizations that have spent decades developing people and creating learning cultures. Along the way, you’ll deepen your understanding of what it means to hold precious what it means to be human while pursuing excellence, innovation, and long-term success.
Participants describe the experience as moving their understanding from the head to the heart.
What you see, experience, and reflect on during the week will stay with you long after you return home, shaping how you think and act about leadership, learning, and developing others.
If you’re ready to deepen your understanding of what it takes to develop people, create the conditions for learning, and develop yourself so you can help others develop, I invite you to join a future cohort of the Japan Leadership Experience.
Learn more and submit your application to schedule a conversation with me about your goals, what you’re hoping to learn, and whether this experience is the right fit for you and your team.
Frequently Asked Questions
What is the best leadership development program for executives?
Participants report that their participation in the Japan Leadership Experience has transformed their approach to leadership, team development, and operational excellence. From more psychologically safe environments to more effective lean practices, past participants have been able to demonstrate tangible results upon returning including increased employee engagement, quality, and delivery.
For a glimpse of the program’s impact, you can listen to past trip participants including Issac Mitchell, Patrick Adams, Shawn Carner, Kecia Kelly, Amy Chaumeton, and Stephanie Bursek share their experiences on my podcast Chain of Learning as well as read more testimonials here and watch testimonial videos on YouTube.
What is the Toyota way?
The Toyota Way is a people-centered leadership philosophy, rooted in an attitude toward learning rather than lean tools alone, that pairs continuous improvement (kaizen) with deep respect for people and long-term thinking to help organizations develop their people as they solve problems. The real essence of the Toyota Way is “learning your way to a dream,” and that respect for people is what Toyota means by “we make things by making people.”
Katie frames the Toyota Way as a leadership model built on three practices—set direction, provide support, and develop yourself through humility and reflection (hansei)—and she calls the resulting culture of everyday learning the Chain of Learning. Leaders experience the Toyota Way firsthand on the Japan Leadership Experience.
How to build a learning organization?
Building a learning organization starts not with new tools, but with a fundamental shift in mindset — an attitude toward learning at every level. The secret behind Toyota and other high-performing cultures isn’t a toolkit; it’s how leaders develop their people.
Through this program, you’ll learn that building a learning organization comes down to three things leaders must do: set clear direction around the problems that truly matter, provide the support and systems that help people grow and solve problems themselves, and develop themselves as learners first. The outcome is a people-centered culture where everyone is both a learner and a leader.
