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STRETCHED BY GROWTH, Toyota evolves to Plan B; The new approach: Make more decisions near new factories.

Publication: Automotive News
Publication Date: 14-MAY-07 		Format: Online
Delivery: Immediate Online Access
Full Article Title: STRETCHED BY GROWTH, Toyota evolves to Plan B; The new approach: Make more decisions near new factories.(New American Manufacturers)(Toyota Motor Corp.)(Company overview)

Article Excerpt
Byline: Lindsay Chappell

Managers quit because they are overworked. Labor costs grow out of synch with business volume. A major capital project runs over budget by hundreds of millions of dollars.

Does this sound like Toyota Motor Corp.'s vaunted North American manufacturing group?

The automaker that literally wrote the book on manufacturing efficiency and has served as a role model for industrial productivity for 20 years recognizes it has a problem in North America. Toyota, up to its neck in market growth and rapid expansion, is launching a multifront reorganization of its North American manufacturing operations.

Its challenge is twofold: Straighten out an organization that has tripled in size in just 10 years and prepare for still more growth.

"We have to find a way to make this organization capable of managing far more complex and bigger-sized operations in the future,'' says Ray Tanguay, executive vice president at Toyota Motor Equipment & Manufacturing North America Inc.

Under a new North American plan, Toyota plans to retrain 30,000 North American plant workers in a "back to basics'' refresher campaign. It will hire new managers and skilled technical personnel to work in its factories around the continent. They will be empowered to problem-solve with one another at different Toyota factories. And it will begin...

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