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The Toyota Way

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Re: The Toyota Way

#91

Post by jakejarvis »

sprafa wrote: post #65
jakejarvis wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The entire decades-long overseas diversion saga surrounding American Toyota pickups has always fascinated me. Top Gear did an episode [0] trying to destroy a Toyota Hilux (similar to the Land Cruiser) and literally couldn't, which explains why it's so popular with terrorists. It's a worthwhile watch if you want to see truck survive after being drowned in water, fire, and the rubble of a demolished skyscraper. Say wha…

It’s not really limited to terrorists, is it? I mean in the popular imagination but essentially technicals are actually great for a lot of rough terrain variable condition combat. But yeah I understand it’s a big deal in the popular imagination.

Not quite sure what you mean by imagination... Of course Toyotas aren't limited to terrorist groups, but it's definitely been a long-standing trend – so much so that the US Treasury Department asked Toyota to open an inquiry internally regarding ISIS and the dozens of Tacomas and Land Cruisers their propaganda videos:

https://abcnews.go.com/International/us-officials-isis-toyot...

Re: The Toyota Way

#92

Post by vvanders »

sebtoast wrote: post #63
lemax wrote: post #53

"The Machine That Changed the World" is a wonderful title on this. Kiichiro Toyoda invented the lean production model after coming to the states and studying the inefficiencies of the assembly lines of Ford. This was a process dependent on modularizing every manufacturing component due to a demand for the Toyota company to serve a market with a need for an immense variety of vehicles, and giving teams ownership of th…

I've never seen Toyoda mentioned as the inventor of the lean model, I usually seen Taiichi Ohno credited for it. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Taiichi_Ohno

W. Deming also played a pretty large role too[1]. The whole history around Lean/Kaizen/etc is pretty fascinating.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/W._Edwards_Deming

Re: The Toyota Way

#93

Post by giobox »

jakejarvis wrote: post #47
Symmetry wrote: post #29

I initially misread that as "The Toyota War". Which was a real thing, named that because Chad used Toyota Land Cruisers to defeat Libya. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Toyota_War

The entire decades-long overseas diversion saga surrounding American Toyota pickups has always fascinated me. Top Gear did an episode [0] trying to destroy a Toyota Hilux (similar to the Land Cruiser) and literally couldn't, which explains why it's so popular with terrorists. It's a worthwhile watch if you want to see truck survive after being drowned in water, fire, and the rubble of a demolished skyscraper. Say wha…

While I don't doubt the Hilux is likely a reliable vehicle, let's not forget it would have made for terrible television if it hadn't survived these seemingly impossible challenges. Top Gear hasn't exactly developed a reputation for being a factually accurate documentary series with many of the challenges being staged etc, so I'd take "literally couldn't" with the large pinch of salt it deserves.

I'd also applaud the efforts of the mechanics who worked on this episode, it was great entertainment if nothing else!

Re: The Toyota Way

#94

Post by artsyca »

Why don't software professionals defer more to the likes of Nintendo, Konami, and other Japanese software companies rather than this manufacturing process?

Re: The Toyota Way

#95

Post by throw0101a »

lemax wrote: post #53

"The Machine That Changed the World" is a wonderful title on this. Kiichiro Toyoda invented the lean production model after coming to the states and studying the inefficiencies of the assembly lines of Ford. This was a process dependent on modularizing every manufacturing component due to a demand for the Toyota company to serve a market with a need for an immense variety of vehicles, and giving teams ownership of th…

> Kiichiro Toyoda invented the lean production model after coming to the states and studying the inefficiencies of the assembly lines of Ford.

See also Deming on quality control:

* https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/W._Edwards_Deming#Work_in_Japa...

Re: The Toyota Way

#96

Post by throw0101a »

vvanders wrote: post #92
sebtoast wrote: post #63

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've never seen Toyoda mentioned as the inventor of the lean model, I usually seen Taiichi Ohno credited for it. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Taiichi_Ohno

W. Deming also played a pretty large role too[1]. The whole history around Lean/Kaizen/etc is pretty fascinating. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/W._Edwards_Deming

Deming was about quality control, which dovetails into lean: you can only do the latter if you know your parts bin is good, and that you can trust your supplier/s to deliver.

Re: The Toyota Way

#97

Post by eldenbishop »

smush wrote: post #89
nradov wrote: post #73

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ironically Toyota now has longer product lives than many other mainstream manufacturers. The Camry and Corolla are on roughly 6 year product lifecycles. The 4Runner has barely changed in 10 years.

> The 4Runner has barely changed in 10 years. To be fair, that may be a purposeful design decision. I consider the fact that the 4Runner can trace its way back to a 1980s Hilux that Top Gear dropped off a building (and still survived) to be nothing but good for its likely reliability. Similarly, its primarily dial-based dashboard (as opposed to the touch-screen everywhere fad right now), truck-based suspension, and o…

Kind of related: Their Land Cruiser is specifically designed for a 25 year service life and is thus very conservative, changing slowly if at.

Re: The Toyota Way

#98

Post by Jtsummers »

artsyca wrote: post #94

Why don't software professionals defer more to the likes of Nintendo, Konami, and other Japanese software companies rather than this manufacturing process?

Are those companies known for their speed and quality of code delivery? Have they published studies and popularised their approaches? Have they, or anyone else, generalized their approaches to things other than specific software categories?

The thing about the manufacturing processes that have come out of Toyota (and others), or the ideas from Deming, Goldratt, and others, is that they're more about general systems theory. What is the flow through the system? How do we know when is an appropriate time to do X? How do we know the focus should be on improving the sales team and not the development team or vice versa?

It may seem like a focus on a manufacturing is misplaced, but many of the ideas transfers over to services as well. Within your business, you have processes which are repeated regularly, information flows with bottlenecks. Which of those should you focus on improving? How do you determine that? How do you measure the improvement efforts? How do you choose how to improve something (top-down directive, or bottom-up participatory effort)? Study Lean, Theory of Constraints, and systems theory and you'll get some answers and ideas.

Re: The Toyota Way

#99

Post by rb808 »

Someone1234 wrote: post #60
rb808 wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The way the stock market is designed (and the fact that stockholders often get to appoint the board who gets to appoint the CEO) means they're going to put short term profits over long term viability. Many companies have been ruined and continue to be ruined by this short-term-ism chase for quarterly and yearly profits. That's a myth. Yes CNBC loves short term stuff as it makes good TV. In the real world see Black…

You call it a "myth" then use one example, that disproves the point (why urge to act against a "myth") and another that's a single data point, while ignoring the rest of the market. That's a pretty poorly explored position.

I would have though that the CEO of the world's largest investment company would count more than "one single data point". I know there are a few examples of short term investors ruining a company - but have you any examples of companies punished for choosing long term over short term?

Re: The Toyota Way

#100

Post by dugditches »

wil421 wrote: post #26

>Principle 5 Build a culture of stopping to fix problems, to get quality right the first time. Quality takes precedence (Jidoka). Any employee in the Toyota Production System has the authority to stop the process to signal a quality issue. I heard culturally Japan and to an extent other Asian manufacturing nations would never actually press the button. Can anyone confirm this?

Not necessarily true.

It's a an employee's duty to bring any abnormality to their superior, and then let them make a decision.

Sometimes something anomalous to a newer employee is actually normal, and an experienced superior knows about.

But sometimes letting an anomaly by doesn't get caught to later, since people further down the line/process aren't looking for or see them. And it's not until the product/process reaches final testing that they become aware. Thus it being cheaper to have stopped the line sooner. And 'punishment' being more severe than simply reporting a mistake or anomaly in the first place.

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