Toyota Motor Manufacturing: what is the root cause of the problem facing TMM's production and how should the manager of assembly address the seat defect problem?

Toyota is doing the right thing by stopping production on an unsafe product, while they try to figure what went wrong with the gas pedals and how to fix them. The plant will shut down one of its two assembly lines as Toyota explores what is causing gas pedals to potentially stick. The 2,500 or so affected employees will continue to work during the down time. They will be offered the opportunity to do training exercises or discuss ways they can improve their processes, the kaizen concept for which Toyota is famed.

The case describes the details about the production process of Toyota and the principles they are following, like JIT & Jidoka in Toyota Production System (TPS), heijunka & kaizen. How they have control the cost, maintain quality through process

Prior to Toyota’s Production System, the company was efficient, yet could not compete with large American competitors such as General Motors and Ford. Therefore, management realized that if the company was to be successful not only in Japan, but globally it would need to improve its manufacturing process. Consequently, the company developed Toyota’s lean manufacturing process, which is still used today. The LMP was used to eliminate waste in the entire production process to become more responsive to market demand and produce high quality products economically. In order to provide superior products, Toyota implemented many revolutionary strategies. For example, the company started, or invented, the Just-in-Time Manufacturing process. The JIT process, according to our text, is used to reduce inventory costs by scheduling supplies to arrive just in time to enter the production process or as inventory stock is depleted (Hill et al., 2015). Toyota used the just-in-time system to improve its supply chain management, which drastically decreased costs and increased the company’s production facilities output as compared to its competitors. In addition to JIT, the company introduced a concept known as Kanban that was included within the new JIT system. The Kanban system was developed by Ohno and was used to arrange for components and/or assemblies manufactured at Toyota to be delivered to the assembly floor only when needed, not before (Hill et al., 2015). Essentially the Kanban

Toyota global production in 2006 was more than nine million vehicles. That’s the equivalent of one car coming off the production line every 3.5 seconds, every minute, every hour, every day.

Toyota is one the most storied companies in the world today, an aspect that has led to it drawing the attention of researchers, journalists and executives who are seeking to benchmark its production system that is extremely famous across the world. This is influenced by the company’s ability to outperform its competitors in terms of cost reduction, reliability, quality and market capitalization. This was exhibited by the company’s ability to replace Daimler Chyrsler as the third largest car company in North America in 2005 in terms of both sales and production.

It is important that Toyota improve their communication and process of evaluating their parts because if they don’t they risk losing customers and market shares. An improved process would also give them reassures that this issue does not arise again. According to Porter (1996) “Delivering greater value allows a company to charge a higher average unit price; greater efficiency result in lower average unit cost” (p.62). Toyota needs to focus more on quality than quantity. After quality is critiqued then they can continue to grow at a lower rate. If Toyota gives their North American companies power to make decisions than it would be a huge improvement to the companies and less risk of safety issues.

In order to speed up the process, Toyota could give a chance to the process manager to make changes to the attachment methods and quality test them. If successful, this could increase the daily yield of parts per day, helping towards the goal.

As if this weren’t enough, quality problems mounted week after week. Only months later in February 2010, the NHTSA revealed that it had received claims citing another life threatening defect in the break system for the Toyota Prius. More than 400 thousand Prius recalls resulted. In April of 2010, customers reported handling issues in the Lexus brand which resulted in another recall of 9,400 Lexus cars and a “Don’t Buy: Safety Risk” rating from Consumer Reports. Also in April, the company voluntarily recalled Siennas to address a problem with corrosion on a spare tire cable. Later that month, Toyota voluntarily recalled 2003 Sequoia SUVs to improve the stability controls. 2010 Tacomas were also recalled for defective front drive shafts. Once the quality icon, Toyota had hit a really low point; so low that credit

Yet, the public perceptions may be at odds with the objective measures. In Toyota’s case, there have been indications that the quality level of the company’s products had fallen off in a span of few years. There are changes that have taken place during a period when most of the company’s close competitors, such as Fords, were producing more cost-effective and efficient automobiles. In addition, the company’s unique production approach and the emphasis on continuous improvement and learning coupled with a matrix structure are key reasons for the company’s leadership in the cat manufacturing industry. Toyota’s Production Systems (TPS) was founded in the principles of “Just-in-time. This approach has less opportunity for slack resources and focuses of the benefits of efficiency on the part of employees and reduction on waste resources (Griffin and Gregory, 5). Further, Toyota Company enacts its production system with the assistance of its human resources strategies, culture, and organizational structure. Toyota’s Production System emphasizes on learning and modesty when it comes to assessing past success and differentiated them from

The supply chain MCC utilizes is deigned to eliminates waste, focuses on quality and reduces time and cost. By the company including production postponement projects the image of customization for a product to meet client's needs. Therefore, if the company strives for shorter lead times it could damage the reputation of the company. Often times, it assumed that products are inefficient and poorly assembled if production is done too quickly. Also, the increase in production can lead to malfunctions in the vehicle. According to the article in Consumer Affair’s (2016), entitled “GM recalls Chevy Cruze vehicles”, it describes how General Motors recalled the 2015 Chevrolet Cruze automobile due to improperly assembly of the driver-side seatbelts.

Due to Toyota’s financial greed and unethical practice, vehicles were wrongly equipped with faulty brakes, sticking pedals and poor quality door looks, which caused death of many Toyota customers and hundreds of dollars in damages. When a company like Toyota acts in an ethically questionable manner, it causes the company to lose customers and develop a negative reputation. Customer tend to lose faith in the company and have to look for better service

Toyota Motor Manufacturing, U.S.A. (TMM) is deviating from the standard assembly line principle of jidoka in an attempt to avoid expenses incurred from stopping the production line for seat quality defects. This deviation has contributed to the inability to identify the root cause of the problem, which has led to decreased run ratios on the line and an excess of defective automobiles in the overflow lot for multiple days. If this problem isn’t fixed quickly, an increased amount of waste will continue to be incurred and customer value will be threatened.

The Toyota Production System (TPS) is the culmination of the company’s dedication to continuous improvement. It is the culture adopted by employees and

In 2009 Toyota Motors (TM) posted a net loss of $4.6 billion ("Market watch," 2014). From 2009 to 2011 Toyota encountered a number of factors contributing to their economic downturn. It began with recalling millions of vehicles, for quality related problems, followed by natural disasters hitting northeastern Japan. These disasters wiped out Toyota’s production capabilities (Tabuchi & Vlasic, 2014). While these events were occurring, the cloud of the 2008 global financial crisis was still being felt. This crisis weakened demand in the automotive industry. This weakened demand increased the competitive landscape for all automotive manufactures. This drove down automotive prices and effectively contribution margins (i.e. sold less

• Toyota crisis responded passive, two months after the fatal crash that happened in California, Toyota forced to recall products.