Top Highlights

• The Toyota Way can be briefly summarized through the two pillars that support it: "Continuous Improvement" and "Respect for People." Continuous improvement, often called kaizen, defines Toyota's basic approach to doing business. Challenge everything. More important than the actual improvements that individuals contribute, the true value of continuo...
• All we are doing is looking at the time line from the moment the customer gives us an order to the point when we collect the cash. And we are reducing that time line by removing the non-value-added wastes. (Ohno, 1988)
• I believe management has no more critical role than to motivate and engage large numbers of people to work together toward a common goal. Defining and explaining what the goal is, sharing a path to achieving it, motivating people to take the journey with you, and assisting them by removing obstacles—those are management's reasons for being.
• They "designed in quality" and built in quality at every step of the process, and they did it with remarkably few labor hours. Not only were Japan's automakers good, their top suppliers were also world class in engineering and manufacturing, and they worked together as a team.
• While the basic product development process seemed similar across the three automakers, and the top tier suppliers were all integrally part of the product development process, there was a sense of partnership between Toyota and its suppliers