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Category Archives: Toyota Production System (TPS)
Akio Toyoda’s Message Shows Real Leadership
Speech by Akio Toyoda Since the birth of Toyota, the company’s philosophy has always been to “contribute to society.” … “Contributing to society” at Toyota means two things. First, it means, “to manufacture automobiles that meet the needs of society and enrich people’s lives.” And second, “to take root in the communities we serve by creating jobs, earning profits and paying taxes, thereby enriching the local economies where we operate.” … Toyota has overcome many challenges during its seven decades … Continue reading
The Trouble with Performance Reviews by Jeffrey Pfeffer
The Trouble with Performance Reviews [the broken link was removed] by Jeffrey Pfeffer Managers don’t like giving appraisals, and employees don’t like getting them. Perhaps they’re not liked because both parties suspect what the evidence has proved for decades: Traditional performance appraisals don’t work. But as my colleague and fellow Stanford professor Bob Sutton and I pointed out in our book, Hard Facts, Dangerous Half-Truths, and Total Nonsense: Profiting from Evidence-Based Management, belief and conventional wisdom often trump the facts. … Continue reading
Toyota Develops Thought-controlled Wheelchair
Toyota has developed a thought-controlled wheelchair (along with Japanese government research institute, RIKEN, and Genesis Research Institute). Honda has also developed a system that allows a person to control a robot through thoughts. Both companies continue to invest in innovation and science and engineering. The story of a bad economy and bad sales for a year or two is what you read in most newspapers. In my opinion the more important story is why Toyota and Honda will be dominant … Continue reading
Toyota Posts Loss of $6.9 Billion in Last Quarter
Toyota Posts Loss of $6.9 Billion in Last Quarter For January-March, Toyota booked a $6.9 billion loss, in line with consensus estimates, and cut its annual dividend nearly 30 percent — the first cut since at least 1994, when it changed its reporting period. … Toyota President Katsuaki Watanabe was more downbeat, stopping short of predicting when sales would pick up in major markets, or when the company would return to profitability as it remains saddled with excess capacity. “Of … Continue reading
NUMMI, and GM’s Failure to Manage Effectively
Gipsie Ranney recently sent me an article on her thoughts on NUMMI and the current problems with the Big Three car makers to post to the Curious Cat Management Improvement Library. NUMMI is the plant that Toyota and General Motors run together as a joint venture. The article is excellent. The answer to a question asked by someone else on the tour was stunning to me. The person asked what kind of computerized inventory system they had at NUMMI. The … Continue reading
Posted in Deming, Lean thinking, Management, Management Articles, Manufacturing, quote, Respect, Systems thinking, Toyota Production System (TPS)
Tagged cars, curiouscat, Deming, lean manufacturing, Management Articles, Manufacturing, respect for people, Toyota, Toyota Production System (TPS)
2 Comments
Helping Employees Improve
One aspect of managing people is to provide positive feedback and show appreciation. Doing so is important. People benefit from encouragement and reinforcement. In addition to just telling them, take action to show your appreciation. The Dilbert workplace is alive and well. And even in above average management systems there is plenty of resistance faced by those looking to improve systems. For those employees that are making the attempt to improve the organization go beyond saying thanks: actually demonstrate your … Continue reading
Idle Workers Busy at Toyota
Idle Workers Busy at Toyota Instead of sending the workers home, as the Detroit makers often do, Toyota is keeping them at the plants, though. The employees spend their days in training sessions designed to sharpen their job skills and find better ways to assemble vehicles. … At its Princeton plant, by contrast, Toyota is using the down time to hone its workers’ quality-control and productivity skills. The company has pledged never to lay off any of its full-time employees, … Continue reading
Financial Market Meltdown
The financial market meltdown has grown to the point where it has profound ramifications for everyone. The common wisdom for financial market variation, for most of us, is just to focus on the long term and don’t worry about short term fluctuations. That is good advice. This panic is threatening to override that wisdom however. There are at least 2 areas to consider: personal finance and business prospects (how managers need to take this crisis into account). On personal finance … Continue reading
Posted in Economics, Management, Toyota Production System (TPS)
Tagged curiouscat, economy, John Hunter, Toyota, Toyota Production System (TPS)
9 Comments
Webcast on the Toyota Development Process
Kenji Hiranabe talks about Toyota’s development process (webcast). Kenji shares a presentation he attended earlier this year by Nobuaki Katayama, a former Chief Engineer at Toyota, and the lessons he learned from him. Continue reading
Toyota Winglet – Personal Transportation Assistance
Toyota has a long term vision. The population of Japan is aging rapidly. Toyota has invested in personal transportation and personal robotic assistance for quite some time. I must admit this new Winglet doesn’t seem like an incredible breakthrough to me (their earlier iUnit seems much better to me – though I am sure much more expensive too). The interest to me is in their continued focus on this market which I think is a smart move. The aging population … Continue reading
Posted in Innovation, Management, Toyota Production System (TPS)
Tagged Innovation, Investing, Japan, Toyota
How to Develop Thinking People
Toyota’s Top Engineer on How to Develop Thinking People [broken link was removed] Hayashi says, “Developing people requires physical endurance.” Frequent follow up is necessary, in person. It is not acceptable to give an assignment and follow up or scold only after three months, during a progress report meeting. Specific actions and detailed follow up are necessary. Excellent advice. Also, when we are required to deliver results with speed, we only give our subordinates small projects so that even if … Continue reading
Posted in Lean thinking, Management, quote, Respect, Toyota Production System (TPS)
Tagged Psychology, quote, respect for people, Systems thinking, tips, Toyota
Drucker’s Ideas at Toyota
The Drucker difference and Toyota’s success [the broken link was removed] by Ira A. Jackson, dean of the Peter F. Drucker Graduate School of Management, the business school of the Claremont Colleges. Because of this core belief in the power of people, Toyota invests in people. And at the same time, the company has come to realize that when people grapple with opposing views … Embrace contradictions as a way of life. Sticking to old practices can lead to rigidity. … Continue reading
Posted in Management, Management Articles, Toyota Production System (TPS)
Tagged Books, Drucker, Toyota
The Contradictions That Drive Toyota’s Success
An interesting article in this month’s Harvard Business Review looks at the seeming contradictions at Toyota – The Contradictions That Drive Toyota’s Success by Hirotaka Takeuchi, Emi Osono, and Norihiko Shimizu Many of Toyota’s goals are purposely vague, allowing employees to channel their energies in different directions and forcing specialists from different functions to collaborate across the rigid silos in which they usually work. For example, Watanabe has said that his goal is to build a car that makes the … Continue reading
Outsourcing To America
Outsourcing To America [the broken link was removed] Toyota began operating in North America in the mid-1980s. It currently operates seven automotive plants there, four of which are in the U.S. A fifth plant is under production in Mississippi. Toyota employs 40,000 manufacturing employees in North America. In addition to the manufacture of cars and trucks, Toyota runs four unit factories in the U.S., where they produce such parts as engines, transmissions and wheels. Toyota also has a wholly owned … Continue reading
Posted in Economics, Lean thinking, Management Articles, Manufacturing, Toyota Production System (TPS)
Tagged cars, Manufacturing, Mexico, Toyota, USA
Toyota Execution Not Close to Being Copied
The Open Secret of Success Toyota’s innovations, by contrast, have [focused] on process rather than on product, on the factory floor rather than on the showroom. That has made those innovations hard to see. But it hasn’t made them any less powerful. At the core of the company’s success is the Toyota Production System, which took shape in the years after the Second World War, when Japan was literally rebuilding itself, and capital and equipment were hard to come by. … Continue reading
Posted in Deming, Innovation, Lean thinking, Management, Management Articles, Popular, quote, Toyota Production System (TPS)
Tagged commentary, Innovation, Toyota
2 Comments
New Management Truths Sometimes Started as Heresies
‘New’ management truths sometimes started as heresies by Cecil Johnson “The most effective management ideas follow a life cycle — from heresy to outlier (championed by a small group of people) to ingrained practice to conventional wisdom,” Kleiner writes. “In the process, if they are genuinely powerful management ideas, they distinguish the organizations that adopt them.” One of the management heresies focused upon by Kleiner that has morphed into accepted management wisdom of the highest order is the Toyota Production … Continue reading →