Toyota is clearly a dominate leader in automobile manufacturing today. There are 14 principles are listed and compared with some of the strategies that United States automakers have employed, it becomes clear why Toyota has succeeded as it has. The 14 principles are known as the "Toyota Way" and are listed below:
1. Base your management decisions on long term philosophies, even at the expense of short term goals
2. Create continuous process flow to bring problems to the surface
3. Use pull systems to avoid over production
4. Level out the workload
5. Build in a method to stop and fix problems when they are discovered, this ensures quality the first time
6. Standardized tasks provide the foundation for continuous improvement and employee empowerment
7. Use visual control so no problems are hidden
8. Use only reliable, thoroughly tested technology that serves you people and processes
9. Grow leaders who thoroughly understand the work, live the philosophy and can and do teach it to others
10. Develop exceptional people and teams who follow your company's philosophy
11. Respect your extended network of partners and suppliers by challenging them and helping them improve
12. Go and see for yourself so that you completely understand the situation
13. Make decisions slowly by consensus, thoroughly consider all options; implement decisions rapidly
14. Become a learning organization through relentless self examination and continuous improvement
Key Factors contributing to the success of the business
Unique features about the product that makes it outstanding.
EFFICIENCY - the most fuel-efficient full-line automaker
PRECISION - won the most Total Quality Awards since 2001
LONGEVITY - in the last 20 years, 80% of Toyota sold and are still on the road today
DEPENDABILITY - highest rate in dependability among all automakers
SAFETY - Toyota's exclusive Star Safety System comes standard on every Toyota
INNOVATION - has more hybrids on the road than all other automakers combined
How the product / company got its name
In 1936, Kiichiro Toyoda built an automobile company from a business that manufactured textile looms. Both firms were named after his surname. We've always wondered: Why the change from "d" to "t"?
When Toyoda decided to start building cars, he needed a name for his new venture. His first business, the humbly named Toyoda Automatic Loom Works Ltd., was founded in 1926 by his father, Sakichi Toyoda. Keeping with tradition, he decided to name his car company in the same fashion.
In order to drum up publicity, Toyoda held a contest to establish a logo for his new venture. Twenty-seven thousand people answered the call.
The winning design consisted of the word "Toyota" — no "d" — depicted in a stylized form of the Japanese katakana alphabet. The Model AA, shown above, was Toyota's first passenger car, and it became the first car to bear the new name and logo.
The change had a few advantages: "Toyota" offers a softer final syllable than "Toyoda," and it rolls off the tongue better for us 'Americans. Writing it in katakana takes eight brushstrokes instead of the d-word's ten, which was also fortuitous — eight is considered a lucky number in Japan, and the character's shape symbolizes future growth and prosperity. A theory also exists that the adjusted spelling served to insulate the car company from the loom manufacturer; if the car firm were to have failed, the thinking goes, the older corporation would have avoided damage. Lastly, the new name represented a convenient break from Japan's agricultural past: "Toyoda" means "fertile rice fields" in Japanese.
Although the original logo was gradually phased out of export use — American-market Toyotas moved to a simple, roman-type badge and then a stylized "T" — it was retained for the Japanese market. It still adorns the Toyota Motor Company's head office in Aichi.