LeanPeak Product Lab

Lean PPD & Learning Cycles Playbook

A practical guide to Lean Product & Process Development — shared language, core mental models, and plays you can use with your team today.

Section 1

Lean PPD Playbook

Chapter 1

Why This Playbook Exists

Who it's for, how to use it, and the working agreements that make it stick. A short read — start here.

→ 2

Chapter 2

Foundations

The six guiding principles and core mental models — Product–Market Pyramid, Set-Based Design, A3 Thinking, Obeya, and more.

→ 3

Chapter 3

Strategy and Value Creation

True North, value streams, portfolio bets, strategy gemba, deployment, and the measures that tell you if it's working.

→ 4

Chapter 4

Discover

Customer & problem understanding, system context, gemba practices, pretotype brochures, and capturing knowledge for reuse.

→ 5

Chapter 5

From Insight to Design & Flow

Set-based concurrent engineering, architecture, development value stream, visual management, and manufacturing partnership.

→ 6

Chapter 6

Validate & Learn

Designing experiments across the development stream, the prototyping ladder, knowledge-based milestones, learning cycles, and post-launch feedback loops.

→ 7

Chapter 7

Validation, Learning, and Decisions

Knowledge reviews, structuring validation, deliberate learning systems, knowledge-based decisions, visual management, and the culture for better decisions.

→ 8

Chapter 8

Scaling, Launch, and Lifecycle

Ramp-up as experiments, synchronizing product and supply chain, launch as a learning event, managing variant complexity, lifecycle roadmaps, and feeding scale learning into future bets.

→ 9

Chapter 9

Culture, Leadership, and Coaching

The culture LPPD needs, lean leadership in development, coaching as the engine of culture change, developing leaders at every level, and practical experiments in your own leadership.

→ 10

Chapter 10

Putting This Playbook to Work

How to start, what to adapt, and how to build momentum for lean product and process development in your organisation.

→

Section 2

Lean 3P Industrialization Playbook

New to Lean 3P?

Start with the Lean 3P Beginner's Guide

What Lean 3P is, when to use 3P vs. kaizen, the 4-phase flow, and how to begin — all in one place.

→ 11

Chapter 11

Why Lean 3P Industrialization?

Launch problems you can't fix on the line, what 3P does differently, when to use it, and what kind of results to expect.

→ 12

Chapter 12

Foundations: How Lean 3P Thinks

Set-based design, concurrent product and process development, delaying decisions not learning, and the operator-as-surgeon mindset.

→ 13

Chapter 13

The 3P Industrialization Flow

The four phases of a Lean 3P program — Information, Innovation, Process Design, and Optimization — and how the three core events fit within them.

→ 14

Chapter 14

Design 3P: Make the Product Buildable Early

CTQ/CTC thinking, Action Priority Number scoring, Quick-Look Value Engineering, and the plays that surface manufacturability problems while the concept is still flexible.

→ 15

Chapter 15

Process 3P: Design the Operational Value Stream

Mapping external and internal flows, identifying high-impact process steps, running 7 Alternatives, and building the future-state production plan.

→ 16

Chapter 16

Production 3P: Layout, Flow, and Vertical Start-Up

Designing physical layout and material flow, PFEP, water spider routes, standard work, poka-yoke, and a phased vertical start-up.

→

Section 3

Lean Learning Cycles Playbook

Chapter 17

Why Lean Learning Cycles

How rushing the early development phase locks in hidden assumptions — and how Lean Learning Cycles turn that phase into a deliberate learning job.

→ 18

Chapter 18

What Is a Lean Learning Cycle?

The seven building blocks and the non-negotiable cadence that give Lean Learning Cycles their power: cadence, not chaos.

→ 19

Chapter 19

The Seven Building Blocks in Practice

Pretotype, priority matrix, key decisions and knowledge gaps, increment plan, iteration plan, execution, and visual knowledge — each block explained with enough detail to start.

→ 20

Chapter 20

Your First Lean Learning Cycle

A five-step guide for weaving one 2-week learning cycle into an ongoing development effort — from picking a decision through to the integration event and deciding what is next.

→ 21

Chapter 21

Roles of Coaches and Teams in Learning Cycles

What “good” looks like for coaches (guarding cadence, clarifying gaps, making learning visible) and teams (framing gaps, running experiments, capturing K Briefs).

→ 22

Chapter 22

K Briefs and Visual Knowledge

How to turn experiments into reusable assets — one-page Knowledge Briefs, trade-off curves, limit curves, and a simple knowledge library that makes future projects start stronger.

→ 23

Chapter 23

From Learning Cycles to Lean 3P

How Lean Learning Cycles feed into the Information and Innovation phases of 3P, and why the hand-over is a shift in emphasis — not a gate.

→

Companion Articles & Plays

As you go through the chapters, dip into a curated set of articles and plays that go deeper on specific topics — from customer-first and OODA to visual management, Lean 3P, and metrics.

Browse Companion Articles & Plays →