Toyota's All-Out Drive To Stay Toyota

(page 2 of 2)

In January he'll be graded not just on his solution but on whether he used an eight-step method that's part of the Toyota Way to figure it out. Watanabe has been known to deep-six projects because the problem itself isn't "severe enough." Oh, and the whole answer has to fit on a single 11x17-inch sheet of paper.

In Japan, a management school called Globis instructs white-collar staffers in the company's philosophy. The aim is to apply the same principles that have worked in manufacturing to other areas of the business. One lesson teaches office workers to apply the "five whys"—a tenet of the Toyota Production System that tells engineers to ask continually why a problem is occurring until they can think of no new answers. Toyota "may soon become the No. 1 automaker in the world, but they still have a strong sense of urgency," says Yoshito Hori, chief executive of Globis.

With quality slipping, Toyota has redoubled training for factory hands. The company has long dispatched Japanese workers abroad to teach their overseas colleagues how to build cars. But with 45% of Toyota's production now outside of Japan, it gets harder to find enough Japanese for these training jobs. So the company has recently opened centers in the U.S., Europe, and Asia where it can school roving experts drawn from the global staff. This will help Toyota increase their ranks from today's level of 2,000. In the U.S., these trainers will work with every one of Toyota's 31,000 factory employees, coaching new hires and teaching veterans to better focus on quality.

The Toyota Technical Training Institute outside Bangalore offers an even more intensive program. In August the company opened the $5.6 million school to teach its principles, car-building skills, and basics like English and history to Indian hires—trying to instill the Toyota Way early in what the company sees as a key market for growth. Toyota built the 21-teacher center because managers believed India's state-run auto engineering institutes are out of date. Says Toyota India boss Atsushi Toyoshima: "Our school can expedite what needs to be taught."

Getting into Toyota Tech is almost as hard as landing a spot in the Ivy League. Toyota winnowed a list of 5,000 applicants to just 64 students for the three-year training program. Before they set foot on the assembly line, they'll spend two years in classes, even learning discipline and personal grooming. (Some Toyota rules: wash your hands before meals; don't drink unboiled water.) One student, 17-year-old Harish Hanumantharayappa, returned to his village for the Hindu New Year on Nov. 8. Clad in his Toyota uniform of beige shirt, gray pants, and a red cap, he is the envy of his childhood friends. Also impressive: Harish has saved $8 from his monthly stipend of $38 to give to his mother. Says Harish: "Toyota has given me an opportunity I could never have imagined."

Links

Watanabe's Way

On Toyota's assembly lines, workers who notice problems can pull the "andon cord," which will stop production. The job of executives at Toyota is similar, President Katsuaki Watanabe told the Harvard Business Review in July. In a lengthy interview, Watanabe said he wouldn't hesitate to slow Toyota's growth if quality were threatened. "When I drive...I constantly think about when I should apply the accelerator and when I should brake," Watanabe said. "I may not need to brake right now, but if a time comes at Toyota when I need to put my foot on the brake pedal rather than the ac-celerator, I won't hesitate to do so."

With Nandini Lakshman in Bangalore