Windsor, Ontario-- It appears that our recession and ensuing sales slump has been good for Toyota as a corporation in general and for Toyota in particular. The problem is that to get a full understanding of the importance of this, one needs to understand both the organizational chart of the corporation and the culture of the corporation.
In the Corporation, individuals often have more than one responsibility. Yoichi Tomihara may be listed as the President of Toyota Canada, but you can bet that he is one of the individuals that is charged with maintaining profit levels and regaining the market share that Toyota lost due both to the recession and to their handling of a very large recall.
During his address to the Canadian media at an invitation-only supper, he stated that “2010 is finished and we must look forward to 2011”. Tomihara San went on to state that after the six model changes (or replacements) already announced, there would be another 12 in 2011 across Lexus, Toyota and Scion. More importantly, he placed as much emphasis on style as he did on engineering which was almost unheard of in Toyota.
During another part of his speech, Tomihara emphasized product affordability by pointing out that content of Toyota Canada vehicles had increased while MSRPs had either remained the same or dropped. The value per unit varied significantly, up to $3,000 per vehicle.
Stephen Beatty, Managing Director, has a misleading title. His responsibilities cut across all aspects of Toyota Canada. If he were in a law firm his name would be Michael Clayton (from the movie of the same name). It is his responsibility to ensure that the more than 16% drop in sales endured in 2010 does not reoccur. During his statement, he assured those present that Toyota has changed. They changed priorities to include sustainability as well as Kaizen which, loosely translated, is the pursuit of perfection. Beatty noted that STAR, Toyota’s new safety package would be standard on all 2011 models.
The last speaker of the evening was Ray Tanguay, introduced as President of Toyota Motor Manufacturing Canada, but also fills the positions of Managing Officer, Toyota Motor Corporation and Executive Vice-President of Toyota Motor Engineering and Manufacturing, North America, Inc. Tanguay talked briefly about how Canada has gone from manufacturing roughly 50,000 units per year to over 400,000 annually.
Most of Tanguay’s dissertation after that was about the people of Toyota Manufacturing. He put Toyota forward as a responsible company that held true to the values it has preached since it came to Canada 46 years ago. Tanguay stated that during this recession, Toyota Manufacturing has not laid off a single person and that in fact, when workers had idle time, they did community projects, were trained and trained even more. In all, over 2.5 million hours were spent training employees, North America-wide, to do a better job. No other manufacturer took such action.
What wasn't on the agenda was as important as what was spoken about. There was no mention of the more than 16% drop in sales over last year or the huge market share less that occured due to the massive recalls. There was no mention of how poorly Toyota reacted in the early days of the recall. Instead, the talk centered on customer satisfaction, style and useful engineering.
Away from the meeting, at least one dealer in separate conversations made the statement that “TCI [Toyota Canada Inc.] is more responsive than ever to our needs and is paying more attention to our customers”. Toyota has not given up trying to build the perfect car, but humility is back in the company. They now know that it can fail, make bad decisions and doesn’t want to do that again.
In the Corporation, individuals often have more than one responsibility. Yoichi Tomihara may be listed as the President of Toyota Canada, but you can bet that he is one of the individuals that is charged with maintaining profit levels and regaining the market share that Toyota lost due both to the recession and to their handling of a very large recall.
During his address to the Canadian media at an invitation-only supper, he stated that “2010 is finished and we must look forward to 2011”. Tomihara San went on to state that after the six model changes (or replacements) already announced, there would be another 12 in 2011 across Lexus, Toyota and Scion. More importantly, he placed as much emphasis on style as he did on engineering which was almost unheard of in Toyota.
During another part of his speech, Tomihara emphasized product affordability by pointing out that content of Toyota Canada vehicles had increased while MSRPs had either remained the same or dropped. The value per unit varied significantly, up to $3,000 per vehicle.
Stephen Beatty, Managing Director, has a misleading title. His responsibilities cut across all aspects of Toyota Canada. If he were in a law firm his name would be Michael Clayton (from the movie of the same name). It is his responsibility to ensure that the more than 16% drop in sales endured in 2010 does not reoccur. During his statement, he assured those present that Toyota has changed. They changed priorities to include sustainability as well as Kaizen which, loosely translated, is the pursuit of perfection. Beatty noted that STAR, Toyota’s new safety package would be standard on all 2011 models.
The last speaker of the evening was Ray Tanguay, introduced as President of Toyota Motor Manufacturing Canada, but also fills the positions of Managing Officer, Toyota Motor Corporation and Executive Vice-President of Toyota Motor Engineering and Manufacturing, North America, Inc. Tanguay talked briefly about how Canada has gone from manufacturing roughly 50,000 units per year to over 400,000 annually.
Most of Tanguay’s dissertation after that was about the people of Toyota Manufacturing. He put Toyota forward as a responsible company that held true to the values it has preached since it came to Canada 46 years ago. Tanguay stated that during this recession, Toyota Manufacturing has not laid off a single person and that in fact, when workers had idle time, they did community projects, were trained and trained even more. In all, over 2.5 million hours were spent training employees, North America-wide, to do a better job. No other manufacturer took such action.
What wasn't on the agenda was as important as what was spoken about. There was no mention of the more than 16% drop in sales over last year or the huge market share less that occured due to the massive recalls. There was no mention of how poorly Toyota reacted in the early days of the recall. Instead, the talk centered on customer satisfaction, style and useful engineering.
Away from the meeting, at least one dealer in separate conversations made the statement that “TCI [Toyota Canada Inc.] is more responsive than ever to our needs and is paying more attention to our customers”. Toyota has not given up trying to build the perfect car, but humility is back in the company. They now know that it can fail, make bad decisions and doesn’t want to do that again.