Key points to consider for your company
The Toyota Way is a unique combination of Japanese culture, the specific culture of the early farming communities of Aichi prefecture, the Toyoda family leadership, influences from American experts, and the specific
evolution of the Toyota group.
Toyota has been very aggressive at globalizing but has done it organically,
growing from within, and working to maintain Toyota culture in all of its
operations globally.
Toyota has faced challenges in bringing their culture, which has many
strong Japanese elements, to other countries with very different national
cultures.
Western culture in particular poses challenges to the Toyota Way due to
strong individualism in the West, short-term thinking, and a different way
of thinking about cause and effect.
Toyota has learned over time the essential elements of the Toyota Way
needed to maintain the strength of the company and refuses to compromise
on transferring those elements to other countries.
Toyota continues to learn how to teach the Toyota Way in other countries
through explicit training (e.g., Toyota Way 2001), on-the-job mentoring,
and extremely consistent leadership.
Toyota's success in bringing the Toyota Way to its local operations throughout
the world gives hope to other companies seeking to learn from Toyota
that this is possible.
The Toyota Way continues to evolve as Toyota grows, faces new circumstances,
and globalizes, and Toyota is far from perfect.
Extracted from: Toyota Cuture: The Heart and Soul of the Toyota Way.
Authors: Jeffrey K Liker and Michael Hoseus.
Published with permission from Tata McGraw-Hill.
Price: Rs 263.
Image: New luxury Toyota vehicles imported from Japan are inspected at Manila port. | Photograph: Romeo Gacad/AFP/Getty Images.
Also read: Tara Tiny @ Rs 99K is the world's cheapest car!
Advertisement
