About Sam

Hi, I’m Sam Yankelevitch.

As a former global operations exec, I have been writing since 2014 and producing online courses about Lean, Communication, Problem Solving and Managing International Projects- watched by over 500,000 students.

I recently took a leap and wrote An Interview with Failure, my first fiction book. I speak at conferences, run training workshops and teach corporate teams how to align, improve communication and swarm problems, before they get out of hand. I post on these topics often on LinkedIn, so please join me. Important note: I’m too old to grow up, too young to stop learning and delighted to give back.

Find me on LinkedIn.

About Me

  • Author of Walking the Invisible Gemba and 4 other continuous improvement books

  • Creator of the Root Cause Analysis, Improve Communication Using Lean Thinking and 8 other popular courses on LinkedIn Learning

  • I’m fully bilingual: Spanish-English

Sam’s Story

He is currently the CEO of Xpress Lingo Solutions, a leader in communication improvement workshops, adopting Lean thinking and quality concepts in support of the supply chain’s need for quality interactions, aligned teams, and a fast responses toward sustainable solutions.


Prior to that, Sam served as the VP and General manager of a German based automotive supplier and the President and as CEO of Ideace, Inc., an international manufacturer and exporter of lock and hardware products.


He has trained numerous teams and presented at conferences such as the ASQ World Conference on Quality and Improvement, BMW Manufacturing Supplier Diversity Conference, The University of South Carolina Darla Moore School of Business and Syracuse University Supply Chain Improvement Symposium, and the Kaizen Institute Congress in San Luis Potosi, Mexico.


Sam is a founding member of the Supply Chain Advisory Board of the Appalachian State University of North Carolina and a member of the Operational Excellence Society Advisory Board.


Sam is an Industrial Engineer with an Executive Masters in Financial management. Besides English, he speaks Spanish fluently and is well versed in German, French, Italian and Hebrew.

How can my work benefit you?

I'm a promoter of daily work practices that help align teams to strategic goals. 

I regularly explore with my clients: how are we communicating? How are we surfacing and solving problems? How we spend our time in meetings? What is encouraged and rewarded -and what is not.

Daily practice builds weekly patterns, which build quarterly results that build yearly growth.

Through my work you can discover…

  • Simple effective ways to address problems, big and small

  • How to improve communication: vertical and horizontal

  • How to re-connect silos to improve execution

  • The benefits of removing the F word (Failure) from your vocabulary.

Please: Read my books, watch my courses.