Professional Documents
Culture Documents
Since hiring contract engineers is necessary for Toyota to strive for the fast growth goals,
training needs to be provided in order to help them adapt Toyotas standard practices and
internalize the Toyota values. This will help build a common understanding among all
employees so that they could work together to maintain consistency in Toyotas product
quality.
Management to work with HR team to set realistic growth target in view of the
available resources
HR team should also coordinate with management during goal-setting process so that the
development goals would not strain the current human capital or come at the sacrifice of
training standards for new hires.
Implementation Feasibility
The second proposed solution may limit Toyotas growth plan. As an organization actively
seeking for expansion, human capital should be fully employed and developed to its
maximum potential.
1 http://www.thetoyotaway.org/excerpts.html
2 http://www.qualitydigest.com/inside/twitter-ed/toyota-there-are-always-limits-growth.html
In contrast, training programme for contract engineers allow Toyota to fully utilize its human
resource to grow its market share sustainably. Besides, it is also highly aligned with its
upheld belief that developing people is its top priority. Training and development
programmes allow the contract engineers to better understand the corporate culture and
standards thus incorporate them into their daily work. Therefore, this is a more effective
solution that targets the root cause.
Timeline
Conduct
Training
Needs
Assessme
nt
Design
Training
Program
me
Determin
e Training
Method
Evaluatio
n During
and After
Training
Action plan
Week
How to carry out the action
Step 1
Conduct
training
needs
assessmen
t
Step 2
Design
training
programme
Step 3
Determine
training
method
Management to assess
the feasibility and HR
managers to incorporate
the feedback and revise
the design accordingly.
HR
managers
should
assign the personnel with
the relevant expertise and
experience to conduct the
training.
Japanese veteran field
professional should be
dispatched to oversee the
progress
and
ensure
1 2 3 4 5 6 7
training is up to
expected standard
Step 4
Evaluation
during and
after
training
the
evaluated through feedback from senior or permanent engineers working with them. Their
own feedback on how well they adapt to Toyotas working environment and standards is also
important to assess the effectiveness of training programme.
Another measure of outcomes would be
-----------------------------------------------------(END)------------------------------------------------------------Firstly, HR team developed the reward system in a way that focuses on cost-cutting rather
than quality-control. It is reported that Toyota disproportionately rewarded managers for
cost-containment versus sustaining product quality3.
Currently, teams and managers receive JIT rewards for completing tasks on time with little
waste. Such JIT rewards include monetary incentives, gold and silver factory floor awards, a
QC circle prize, and a QC circle contest4. Therefore, employees tend to be negligent about
quality problems occurred in order to achieve cost-cutting goals.
HR team should develop a reward and performance monitoring system based on a balance
of cost-containment and quality management. For example, manufacturing teams that
maintain the high quality of products at adequate cost will be rewarded with monetary
incentives. This helps shift managers focus from merely cost-cutting back to quality-control.
The company should also reward employees who point out potential quality problems along
the way during their manufacturing process. This encourages more people to take the
responsibility to monitor the process, ensuring higher quality.
Little to talk about Toyotas culture should be more effectively incorporated through
training of new employees and bonding activities. HR team needs to ensure that every
employee understands the companys concern of quality throughout the manufacturing
process.
Toyota practices centralized decision-making
culture does not encourage feedback on quality problems. Employees are not willing to
report negative news or potential problems discovered in manufacturing process as the
company culture does not provide enough incentive for them to do so. They are afraid that
recall may cause more severe impact, thus usually avoid the problem until fatal incident
happened and external investigation came in (Linkedin).
The Toyota Way principle 5 stated Build a culture of stopping to fix problems, to get quality
right the first time.5 However, in the 2010 incident, after-sales service employees neglected
the quality concerns raised by customers. As a result, Toyota had to conduct a massive
recall which escalated the impact of the quality glitch. Thus, we can see that such principle is
not very effectively implemented through the training process of relevant employees.
Cost-effect analysis
3 https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/20140910121649-31890108-a-leadership-case-study-how-hr-caused-toyota-crash
4Should You Reward Employees For Success With JIT Processes http://www.brighthubpm.com/monitoring-projects/74341appropriate-reward-systems-for-jit-processes/
5 http://www.toyota-global.com/company/history_of_toyota/75years/data/conditions/precepts/index.html
HR PROCESSES:
1. Hiring
Lack of manpower temp. contract engineers but may not meet the standard of
TOYOTA communication prob. with suppliers AND diff. ways of doing things not
sustainable quality prob.
2. Training
-
Should ensure the employees have met the standard after training
3. Feedback
Low incentives for employees to feedback on potential quality problems OR managers
ignorance of the feedback
4. Reward & Compensation System
-
Reward based on quantity not quality because of the high growth targets
Toyotas accelerator
pedal recall, which affected a vast number of vehicles, came down to design flaw was in a
single, relatively simple part used on many models and sourced from a non-Japanese
supplier in order to diversify the supply chain and reduce costs
FEASIBILITY
Toyota had set targets to surpass General Motors as the worlds number one car maker that
would have required for them to rapidly increase their global share from 7.3% in 1995 to
10% over the next decade. Toyota did in fact achieved a global market share of 9.7% in
1998 and set a new target of 15% by 2010. However, these growth target and accelerated
growth cycles pushed Toyotas human resources to the limit becoming the catalyst for the
resulting quality failures in their products.
http://www.qualitydigest.com/inside/twitter-ed/toyota-there-are-always-limits-growth.html
In order to meet their targets, Toyota had hired significant numbers of new employees and
increased their overseas manufacturing facilities from 37 to 53 between the years 2002 and
2008. However, the expansion of the organization allowed management little opportunity to
adjust their systems and practices to properly integrate and accommodate the new changes
as the company was unable to support continuous improvement through training and
developing their workers.
Organizational incentives for Toyota also became skewed towards growth, and neglected the
traditional specific policies that focused on quality, resulting in more managerial decisions
becoming biased in favour of the short-term rewards.
Strategies
Solutions:
Current solutions:
In addition to unifying employees, the company has also allowed greater flexibility when it
comes to ways of working.
Traditionally there was a belief at Toyota that if youre not here, the work is not getting done.
Now the company is allowing more telecommuting as well as relaxed dress codes. Plus
decisions are now more manager-led. Things are a lot more liberal than when I started
working here 15 years ago, Kirkpatrick points out.
https://www.simply-communicate.com/case-studies/company-profile/how-toyota-executeswell-driven-strategy-recover-crisis