Process Strategy and Analysis For Toyota Motors Corporation Essay

IntroductionWhen cheeks seek to cleanse or transform their resources into goods and receiptss, they atomic number 18, in a bearing, developing their adjoin arrangement in producing their customer and harvesting peculiar(prenominal)ations at refuse be and less managerial constraints. As companies argon targeting global markets at present, apiece organization involve to decide on long- fund warlike goals that argon strategic in nature.In devising these fulfill decisions, managers need to focus on controlling matched priorities wish well fictitious character, flexibility, sequence, and cost to neat the global demand for their mathematical products. In having a gestate at Toyota labour Corporations serve up scheme, it will be helpful to realize why their decisions for both service and manufacturing processes ar successful. By determining the processes that comprise their operations, we will be able to assess if their order chains ar managed efficiently an d efficaciously.According to Krajewski et al. (2007), a process strategy specifies the pattern of decisions make in managing processes so that they will achieve their competitive priorities. Also, a process strategy guides a variety of process decisions, and in turn is guided by operations strategy and the organizations ability to obtain the resources necessary to meet them. Thus, a process strategy consists of decisions that help define the value chain. Usu completelyy these decisions seek the improvement of processes and they are done roughly likely whenA gap exists between competitive priorities and competitive capabilities.A tender or substantially modified service or product is being offered.Quality must be improve. rivalrous priorities own changed.Demand for a service or product is changing. watercourse implementation is inadequate.The cost or availability of inputs has changed.Competitors are gaining by victimisation a new process. youthful technologies are available. Someone has a break-dance idea.As a leading auto manufacturer in the humanity, Toyota Motor Corporation sells its vehicles in more(prenominal) than 170 countries and regions worldwide. Toyotas primary markets for its automobiles are japan, North America, Europe and Asia. Employing nearly 300,000 people, its headquarters is located in Toyota City, Japan. Their products embroil passenger cars, recreational and sport-utility vehicles minivans and trucks. Toyotas subsidiary, Daihatsu Motor Company, also produces and sells mini-vehicles and compact cars. piece of music another brand, Hino Motors produces and sells commercial vehicles. More importantly, Toyota manufactures automotive farewells, components and accessories for its own use and for sale. Toyota has 52 manufacturing facilities in 27 countries and regions (Toyota Website).Process Strategies in ToyotaOne of the most historied processes that Toyota Motor Corporation had made famous is the Toyota Production System (TPS). At present, TPS is also known for a variety of terms like fragile corpses or salutary-in- m (JIT) manufacturing, play production, stockless production and zero inventories. Cox and Blackstone (1998) defined incline schemas as a school of thought of production that emphasizes the minimization of the amount of all the resources (including time) used in the various activities of the enterprise prevail systems thinking was initiated and genuine as the TPS.It was Toyotas vice president Taiichi Ohno who pushed for the TPS beginning in 1937 when he discovered that labor at American manufacturers was nine times more productive than labor at Nipponese manufacturers (Monden 1983, p. v). Since in that respect was a hale to improve aft(prenominal) population War II because capital was curb and production volumes were low, Ohno researched on some methods they can adopt in Toyota to bushel their production system pasture better. However, it was not until the 1973 oil crisis that m ost Japanese manufacturers became interested in TPS and it was not until the end of the 1970s that a portentous number of U.S. manufacturers began to investigate TPS.The Toyota Production System became widely known in the unite States in 1983 when a give up of that title was published. During the 1980s, the popular term in the United States for the TPS system was just-in-time manufacturing. At the beginning of the 1990s, the term tend systems became popular because of a series of books and articles by U.S. consultants and researchers in which they referred to TPS as lean systems, because they allow more and more to be done with less and less. accompaniment is that Ohno unless borrowed important roots of lean systems from deuce distinct American institutions Henry Fords mass production system and the supermarket. race Systems That Sparked More Process StrategiesIn the book by Womack and Jones (1996), entitled Lean Thinking, they simplified Ohnos lean systems approach. As it is not just a set of techniques but a management philosophy, this means managers must have a different mental model or perspective of managing the manufacturing process. The louver go or principles to develop this mental model are but specify value for each specific product.Identify the value rain cats and dogs for each product.Make value flow without interruptions.Let the customer impel value from the producer.Pursue perfection.During the 1980s, some U.S. companies have adopted lean systems success fully. that many more failed or even refused to take action. Many managers are skeptical that TPS could not succeed in the United States or it provided no real benefits. However, the publication of a book titled The Machine That Changed the World (Womack, Jones & Roos, 1990) ended the debate about whether lean systems created real, lasting benefits. The book presented the results of a collar-year study of automobile manufacturing throughout the developed world.They form that in 199 0 a Japanese plant in Japan took 16.8 hours to institute an auto, while a U.S plant in the United States took 25.1 hours per car. Not only did a Japanese plant produce cars faster, its cars had fewer defects per hundred vehicles, lower space requirements, and lower inventories than their competitors. Their findings also indicate that it is the management system and not the countrys kitchen-gardening that is answerable for the success of lean companies, since Japanese plants in the United States performed better than U.S. plants on all criteria.Aside from the TPS, Toyota pursued total tone of voice management or kaizen, a change strategy that involves a perpetual additive improvement of work procedures. Using kaizen, production-line employees are made responsible for finding ship canal to improve work procedures to drive down costs and drive up quality. Individually, and in quality groups or circles, employees suggest ways to improve how a particular Toyota car model is made. Over time, from their thousands of suggestions, incremental innovations made to the car assembly process result in study improvements to the final product. Employees receive cash bonuses and rewards for finding ways to improve work procedures, and the result has been a never-ending change magnitude in car quality and reduced manufacturing costs.In the 2000s, under the leadership of Toyotas new president, Jujio Cho, the order sought to increase the animate of change to further improve its faculty and quality to gain an edge over its major competitors such as GM, Ford, and Daimler-Chrysler. It has begun a series of new kinds of change programs, each directed at improving some aspect of its operations, which Toyota hopes will bring both incremental and radical changes to the way it operates.Some incremental change programs involve modify its kaizen program, such as pokayoke, or mistake-proofing. This initiative concentrates on the stages of the assembly process that have led t o most previous quality problems employees are require to double- and triple-check a particular stage to discover defective parts or to fix improper assembly operations that lead to subsequent customer complaints.another(prenominal) program is Construction of Cost Competitiveness for the 21st degree centigrade program or CCC21, which involves working with the political partys suppliers to find ways to reduce the costs of Toyotas car components by 30 percentagesomething that will result in billions of dollars in savings. Toyota has also introduced a new manufacturing process called GBL, which uses a sophisticated new assembly process to break a car body firmly in place during production.This allows weld and assembly operations to be performed more accurately, resulting in better-quality cars. GBL has also enabled Toyota to build factories that Toyota to build factories that can assemble several different kinds of models on the kindred production line with no loss in efficienc y or quality. This is a major competitive advantage. The companys global meshing of plants can now rapidly change the kinds of cars they are making depending on buyers demands for various models at different points in time (Dawson, 21 February 2005). separate radical change efforts have focused on revamping Toyotas reading and fancy process to keep up with changing customer needs and demographics. In the 1990s, for example, the age of the average Toyota car buyer steadily rose. notwithstanding Toyotas climbing global sales (which exceeded $203 billion in 2006), the company was criticized for failing to understand how the market was changing. Some blamed the problem on centralized decision making at the company and a culture that had long been dominated by Toyotas cautious and frugal Japanese figure of speechers. Rather than designing innovative, flexible vehicles customers were increasingly demanding, Toyota continued to focus on sleep withting costs and increasing the qualit y of its vehicles.To quickly get an improved design process into gear, President Cho bolstered two new change techniques to radically alter the design process PDCA and obeya. Obeya is based on frequent cogitate sessions among engineers, designers, production managers, and marketers designed to speed new model cars to the market. PDCA (plan, do, check, action) is a program designed to empower the companys designers outside of Japan to intervene in the car development process and champion designs that meet the needs of local customers.The results of promoting a flexible, decentralized car design process were the speedy trigger of the rugged eight-cylinder Tundra pickup truck and the angular, ScionxB compact in the United States, as well as the Yaris, Toyotas best-selling European car. The Yaris was designed in Europe, and its success in that respect led to its subsequent introduction in Japan where it also sold well ( pile, 2004).Conclusionthroughout its existence, we could see th at Toyota has managed their process strategies effectively as they root everything out from the TPS. by the TPS, they continued to change and improve their processes to lessen production time, lessen the surpluss and check production efficient to the benefit of both the company and its employees. Also, it is important to telephone line that, despite all these changes, their customers remain at the core of their focus as Toyota seeks to meet all their demands.As for their management, the decisions are transformer(a)d into actual process designs or redesigns. This matches the complementary philosophies for process design (1) process reengineering and (2) process improvement (Krajewski et al., 2007). In this regard, we could say that Toyota Motors Corporation has an excellent decision patterns to further improve their manufacturing processes in the future.The Process Analysis of the Toyota Motor CorporationIntroductionIn the book The Toyota Way, Liker (2003) claimed that Toyota has the fastest product development process in the world. In analyzing their manufacturing process, Liker found that new cars and trucks take only 12 months or less to design in Toyota, while competitors typically require two to three years.Also, Toyota has been benchmarked to be the best in its class by all of its peers and competitors throughout the world. This is because Toyota maintains juicy quality, high productivity, faster manufacturing speed and flexibility in processing their products (p. 5). all in all these successes are due to the TPS that Liket (2003) summarized into 4 Ps (Problem-Solving, People and Partners, Process and philosophy (see see 1).Figure 1. 4Ps That Comprise the Toyota Production Systems (Source Liker, 2003).Analyzing the TPSIn the process part of the TPS, we can see at its core is the goal of eliminating waste. For example, in the manual of arms assembly operation of a truck chassis assembly line (see Figure 2). The floozie takes many individual go, b ut generally only a small number of the footfalls add value to the product, as far as the customer is concerned. In this case, only the three steps identified add value.Although some of the non value-added steps are necessary (for example, the operator has to reach to get the power tool), the point here is to minimize the time spent on non-value-added operations by positioning the tools and material as close as possible to the point of assembly. Toyota has identified seven major types of non-value-adding waste in business or manufacturing processesOverproduction. Producing items for which there are no orders, which generates such wastes as overstaffing and repositing and dose costs because of excess inventory. delay (time on hand). Workers merely serving to watch an automated machine or having to stand around postponement for the next processing step, tool, supply, part, etc., or just plain having no work because of stockouts, lot processing delays, equipment downtime, and capa city bottlenecks. superfluous transport or conveyance. Carrying work in process (WIP) long distances, creating ineffectual transport, or moving materials, parts, or finished goods into or out of storage or between processes.Overprocessing or in rectify processing. Taking unneeded steps to process the parts. Inefficiently processing due to poor tool and product design, causing unnecessary motion and producing defects. drop is generated when providing higher-quality products than is necessary.Excess inventory. Excess afflictive material, WIP, or finished goods causing longer lead times, obsolescence, damaged goods, transportation and storage costs, and delay. Also, extra inventory hides problems such as production imbalances, late deliveries from suppliers, defects, equipment downtime, and long setup times.Unnecessary movement. Any wasted motion employees have to perform during the course of their work, such as looking for, reaching for, or stacking parts, tools, etc. Also, walking is waste.Defects. Production of defective parts or correction. darn or rework, scrap, replacement production, and inspection mean wasteful handling, time, and effort.Unused employee creativity. Losing time, ideas, skills, improvements, and schooling opportunities by not engaging or listening to your employees (Liker 2003, p. 28-29).Figure 2. Waste in a Truck Chassis Assembly Line (Source Liker, 2003).Figure 3. Timeline of Waste in a assess System (Source Liker, 2003).TPS A finis Driven ProcessLike any system, the TPS is a goal-driven set of relate or linked activities. Managers who recognize that they are managing a system are aware of two main points (1) the system reacts to any solution and (2) the system controls the behavior of those individuals who operate within it. The first point means that there are often unintended consequences when a solution to a problem in a system is introduced.To avoid unintended consequences, managers must fully understand the system. The second point means that managers must avoid attributing the problems in a system to the character of the individuals within the system. The manager must kinda constitute how the structure of the system is shaping the choices of the individuals within the system. By intelligence these two points, the manager can now redesign the system to increase the systems performance.The incorrect use of performance measures can embarrass the successful introduction of lean systems. For example, a performance measurement system that encourages high equipment and high labor utilization often discourages production at the rate demanded by the customer. Indeed, these performance measures actually encourage large-batch production, thus creating the waste of overproduction and decreasing the systems ability to respond to the customer.Firms that consume lean systems often use a performance measure called boilersuit equipment effectiveness (OEE). Soiichi Nakajima (1988) first formulated this performance measure to assess how effectively equipment is maintained and operated. Figure 4 shows six types of capacity losses in the right-hand column (breakdown losses, setup and adjustment losses, idling and minor stoppages, speed losses, quality defects, and start-up and yield losses). These capacity losses are organized into three categories downtime losses, speed losses, and quality losses.Figure 4. Six Probable Causes For Equipment Losses (Source Masaji & Goto, 1992). acute performance measurements are an important part of any manufacturing system, thus TPS support the elimination of possible waste. The operations manager must select the performance measurements that will encourage behaviors that lead to the in demand(p) business performance. In TPS, the desired business performance is shorter flow time, reduced costs, and faster response to the customer.Another advantage of the TPS is its support towards employee empowerment as a means for continuous improvement. Toyota empowers its e mployees by preparation them to use the scientific method to continuously improve processes. The scientific method involves four elements surmise, hypotheses, data, and verification.In the research of Spear and Bowen (1999) they indicated that the scientific method is integrated into the Toyota Production System so that every time a ponder is performed is an experiment. This creates a system where all the work processes are very specified and structured, but the system itself is very flexible and responsive. Toyota implements the scientific method as part of four unspoken territorial dominions that everyone in the organization must learn and practiceHighly Specified Work Toyotas first rule requires that managers, engineers, and line workers fully understand how a business enterprise is to be done and its relationship to other jobs. By ensuring that every job has a very clearly defined set of steps, it is obvious when the correct process is not being followed and it is also obv ious when more training is needed or when the job definition needs to be changed. This allows quick identification and correction of any problems that occur. This first rule reduces variance in how work is done. By creating a highly specified sequence of steps to perform the job, Toyota is actually proposing a theory that this procedure is the best way to do the job. Given this theory, two implicit hypotheses in every precedent job specification are first that each person doing the drill is capable of performing it correctly and second that performing the activity as specified actually creates the expected outcome.Direct Connections Toyotas second rule states that there must be direct, unambiguous communication between each customer and supplier. Direct, unambiguous communication means that each customer and each supplier know the exact form and quantity of goods and function to be provided. The theory implicit in this second rule is that the supplier has the capacity to meet th e customers needs as they are communicated. This theory leads to two hypotheses (1) the customers requests will be for goods and services in a specific mix and volume and (2) the supplier can respond to the customers requests. The production process generates data through the observation of the customer-supplier interactions.Simple Direct Pathways Toyotas trinity rule is that all pathways must be simple and direct. This means that goods and services must flow to a specific person or machine. The inherent theory in this rule is that having simple and direct pathways will quickly reveal any source of variances in the flow of goods and services. This rule suggests two hypotheses (1) every supplier is necessary and (2) any supplier not affiliated to the pathway is not necessary. Each day of production provides data to break the hypotheses. Was there a supplier who was not machine-accessible to a pathway? Obviously any supplier or activity not connected to the flow pathway can be e liminated. This rule eliminates noise from the system and means that there are no pooled queues of completed work from suppliers waiting for the customers to use. Instead, completed work leaves one activity and goes to the next activity. If one supplier has a high variance in deliveries, their variance will not be hidden by the deliveries of the other suppliers.Scientific Method Toyotas fourth rule requires that employees be trained to formulate and test hypotheses about how they can improve their job activities. Toyota constantly encourages its workers to conduct experiments trying to identify a better method of performing their job activities.ConclusionIn analyzing the Toyota Production System, we can deem that the company seeks to benchmark their operations to suffer more efficient. This is the reason why that the TPS is highly regarded among all companies in the world because it focuses on setting quantitative goals for improvement. TPS seeks to make Toyotas manufacturing proc esses to be made simple and they are utilizing a scientific model that goes one step further it transforms their processes to be more dynamic. The Toyota management is also constantly host ideas for reengineering or improving a process become apparent after documenting the process.They are carefully examining the areas of substandard performance, efficient interaction between departments and eventually making customers preferences a prime priority. The ultimate goal of TPS is to apply the elevated of one-piece flow to all Toyotas business operations, from product design to launch, order taking, and physical production by eliminating the unnecessary waste.Thus, the TPS is an all-encompassing philosophy that includes product design, process design, equipment and facilities design, supply chain coordination, job design, and productivity improvement. If there is one key to successful implementation of TPS, its adopting a holistic approach. This is probably the reason why Toyota remai ns to be one of the most admired companies in the world because they implemented a system that cut all the unnecessary costs and produced faster results without compromising the product expectations of their stakeholders.ReferencesCox, J.F. & Blackstone, J.H. junior (Eds). (1998). APICS Dictionary, 9th ed. Alexandria, VA APICS.Dawson, C. (2005, Feb 21). A China Price for Toyota. Business Week, 3921, 50-51.Hill C.W.L. (2004). Toyota, in C. W. L. Hill & G. R. Jones, Strategic Management An Integrated Approach, Boston Houghton Mifflin.Krajewski, L.J., Ritzman, L.P. & Malhotra, M.K. (2007). Operations Management Processes and Value Chains, 8th ed. NJ Prentice-Hall.Liker, J. (2003). Toyota Way. Blacklick, OH McGraw-Hill Professional Publishing.Monden, Y. (1983). Toyota Production System, Norcross, GA Industrial design and Management Press.Nakajima, S. (1988). 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