Not Tom Polen of BD, otherwise known as Becton, Dickinson and Company, No. 211 on the Fortune 500. The company sells 35 billion devices a year ranging from hypodermic needles to advanced monitoring platforms. Polen talks about lean manufacturing with the same zeal that other CEOs talk about AI. He even shares the same sensei (master teacher) with Culp, Yukio Katahira. Polen became CEO in 2020, launching BD Excellence in 2024 to scale lean practices across the company, going from 50 kaizen projects to 1,500 last year. He argues that lean is a prerequisite for leveraging AI. 

“If you’re not doing lean, do lean first,” he told me. “Get those systems and capabilities and then start applying AI on top of solid processes and systems. I’m 100% convinced that AI with lean is where you get the power.”

He says lean has enabled a cultural shift, too, as the company completed the spinoff of its $3.3 billion-a-year bioscience and diagnostic solutions units earlier this month to focus on its $18.5 billion medical technology business. While BD faces pricing pressure in China and a range of challenges at home, its stock is up 19% this year while the S&P 500 is flat. With a streamlined operation and a workforce focused on daily improvements, BD’s lean champion-in-chief feels optimistic. “Leaders’ responsibility is to absorb complexity up and push simplicity down,” Polen said. “You get what you measure, but you get what you celebrate even more than you get what you measure. Every promotion, every plant visit, every town hall is used to celebrate continuous improvement behaviors, not just financial outcomes.”

Contact CEO Daily via Diane Brady at diane.brady@fortune.com

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The markets

S&P 500 futures were down 0.37% this morning. The last session closed up 0.56%. STOXX Europe 600 was down 0.61% in early trading. The U.K.’s FTSE 100 was down 0.67% in early trading. Japan’s Nikkei 225 was up 0.57%. Chinese markets are closed for the New Year. South Korea’s KOPSI was up 3.09%. India’s NIFTY 50 was down 1.410%. Bitcoin was down to $67K.

Around the watercooler

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CEO Daily is compiled and edited by Joey Abrams, Claire Zillman and Lee Clifford.