1. When customers drive Toyota, the gemba is how they are using the product and what works for them. Gemba means observing firsthand how products are designed, build, used, and problems occurring.
2. Respect for other people means you feel the pain of critical feedback
3. "Show us the bad news first", if we do not give people accurate feedback based on real behavior they are not growing and we are not respecting. The leader must put people in positions to work hard and succeed.
4. The root cause of many lean system failing is lack of adequate leadership.
5. Toyota faced three crisis between 2007 and 2011 testing self reliance: a) the lexus crash, b) 12 vehicles with slightly sticky brakes and less than perfect pedal acceleration control c) and a Great recession resulting in a surge in steel prices.
6. In 2008, large suv sales dropped 40% resulting in greater supply than demand. Toyota responded by reducing production. Overproduction creates excess inventories and wastes valuable capital that could be used for growth or future expenditures. Toyota did not layoff employees but, instead, focused on leadership training, kaizen. Toyota trimmed excess spending by cut bonuses and temp labor and overtime.
7. The 110 mph Lexus crash was linked to an "all weather floor mat " shifted blame to a dealership, who failed to secure the mat with clips too hold it in place.
8. Next, the sticky brake pedal was determined "not be defect". Ray LaHod said "The verdict is in. There is no electronic-based cause for unintended high-speed acceleration in Toyotas. Period." 12 pedals out of 2 million vehicles were discovered. However, vehicles were recalled because Toyota puts safety as a premium value.
9. In 2011, the Japanese 9.2 earthquake caused a 50 ft tsunami to strike Japan's east coast. Small car production of Yaris, Scion, XB, and Scion xD were impacted by the earthquake. Many of the basic raw materials its suppliers depended came from the north near the epicenter of disaster. 500 parts were identified as not procurable. 100s of Toyota engineers went with equipment vendors too solve problem for the suppliers, affected by the earthquake. By utilizing employee creativity and know how, in three months, the unavailable part count fell to 30 and from Mar 2011 too June 2011, Toyota was able to put most of its companies in full production.
10. Toyota identified problems that lead to failure to respond quickly and appropriately in a growing crisis to customer concerns. Time between was examined: time between when a customer called with a concern and when Toyota responded with a design change or a recall; time between a NHTSA complaint or media attack and a Toyota response.
11. Did Toyota bridge the perception gap between North America Executives and Japanese Executes? One of the clear failures was critical decision were being made by leaders who were not at the gemba. Toyota had failed to seriously listen to customer perceptions of features of North America executives in engineering, sales, and communication. The gemba leaders had a better understand of the perceptions and problems of perceived failures of quality and safety. The further away from gemba, the poorer the decisions will be made. Why were executives and engineers removed from gemba making the decisions about information to be released?
12. Customers were concerned about adaptive cruise control accelerating their cars. Leaders had to go and see the problem.
13. In 1997, Toyota learned and began to practicing having two suppliers of a critical part, in at least two geographical areas.
14. Akio toyoda talked to people and did not appear aggressive. He said, "I was thinking about the dealers, and customers, and suppliers, and our US colleagues in Toyota". Toyoda did not blame customers, the government; instead he, apologized for pain and inconvenience; and then set his company moving forward to uncover problems and solve them. Toyoda message and feelings emphasize his commitment to respect partners and suppliers and help them improve.
15. Toyota established a design quality innovation division reporting to the Vice president of Research and development, to bring customer complaints to the power project managers and open direct communication lines. Customer complaints needed to be resolved by engineering design.
16. Adaptive cruise control to avoid frontal collision can be shocking because the car automatically begins to decelerate. Does the Adaptive system save lives? Does it do a better job than a real driver at avoiding collision? Does the system make mistakes? Can the driver override the system, if a mistake occurs?
17. Toyota looks for root causes to problems. One concern I have had is hearing a North American Toyota executive say the company was position on brand.
18. Shu ha ri : novice, advanced beginner, competent, proficient, and expert. Shu hai ri sets the stage for self development. The leader learns by doing. Break the skill into chunks and learn from errors observed by the teacher. The teacher will challenge the student to learn and think and find creative countermeasures to root causes. Shu ha ri takes time and energy to reflect on further opportunities for improvement. At ha the student practices unsupervised and checks with the master and applies the rules creatively. At ri the actions are natural and the student is in the position to gain his own understanding and imraprove on what they have learned. At ri the student can do the job without thinking or supervision, the five aspects of shu ha ri are standardized work, deep observation by the teacher, no answers so the student learns by struggle, on job development to get feedback, and a steady increase of challenges for growth.