BUS 515 Operational Strategy For the Future Mobility Assignment

Answer:

Introduction:

Toyota is one of the renowned motor companies that have brought revolution in the automotive industry by its quality performance. The journey of Toyota has been started in 1937. As per the reports, it earns huge amount of revenue per year by providing quality service to the large number of consumers.  It has set a milestone in selling hybrid electric vehicles. It covers huge market share in the motor industry and it is known for providing quality service to the local as well as global consumers. It has not only brought revolution by its motor vehicles, it has introduced a unique and innovative organizational structure with unique managerial style that distinguishes it from the other rival companies. It is run by a team of experienced and skilled leaders who are giving their tireless effort to establish a bright future for the organization (toyota.com, 2017).

The following article has concentrated on various aspects of the organizational structure and strategy of Toyota. It is demonstrated various issues regarding the organizational operation and product manufacturing.

Weakness of the Product Life Cycle of Toyota:

Although, the organizational leaders of Toyota ensure that the organization is providing high quality service to their potential consumers, there are some loopholes in the organizational structure that can be harmful for the growth of the organization. There are two major weaknesses in the product life cycle of Toyota. They are as follows:

Proactive Approach:

The organizational management of Toyota does not take any active step to fight against the complete demise of any product. It is responsibility of every business organization to take efficient actions to protect their products from the ultimate demise and restructure the product design so it can survive in the competition. However, in case of Toyota, they do not pay much attention to the fact, which may lead the organization to face many awful consequences (Kumada et al., 2014).

False Assumption:

The organizational management of Toyota often makes false assumption about the market trend and requirement of the consumers. It leads them to face many obstacles. They often incorporate some strategies in the organizational structure, which is not suitable for their organization. It is harmful for the organizational management to earn long-term goal (Gilroy et al., 2014).

Strategy of Toyota:

Strategic Communication:

The organizational management of Toyota needs to incorporate effective communication strategy in the organization. They need to maintain communicative relation with their internal and external stakeholders. It will be helpful for them to identify the requirement of their consumers. At the same time, they can enhance the quality of their service by maintaining strong and interactive relation with their employees and other stakeholders. Effective communication works as a public relation officer for business organization. It will help the organization to earn reputation in the society (Elnaga & Imran, 2014).

Healthy Working Environment:

Healthy working environment works as a major strength for every business organization. Management of Toyota must maintain strong relation with the executive team of the organization. They must often meet with them to discuss about the organizational issues and strategies. It will pave the path of the organizational success. Management must involve their subordinates in the organizational decision making process to make them aware about their organizational strategy. Toyota authority must realise that it is important to meet the satisfaction level of the employees. They must design their organizational structure in such a manner, so it offers some privileges to their internal stakeholders. It will be helpful for them to meet their expectation level (Lai et al., 2015).

Market Research:

The organizational management of Toyota must often conduct market research to observe the market trend and preference and requirement of the consumers. It works as a major tool for business organization to identify their responsibility areas where they need to more effort to meet the expectation level of the consumers. Hence, by using this tool Toyota will be able to put a strong footprint in the industry (Thompson et al., 2015).

Supply Chain Management of Toyota:

A strong supply chain management of Toyota distinguishes it from other automobile company. It shares a strong bonding with their suppliers and distributors, which helps them to beat their rival companies by providing quality service to the loyal consumers. The key components of the supply chain of Toyota are-

Suppliers:

Toyota maintains a strong relation with the suppliers to ensure that they provide high quality raw material to them. The quality of the product is highly dependent on the quality of the raw material. Steady and transparent relation with the consumers helps the organization to meet the expectation level of the consumers (Chowdhury, 2014).

Logistic Management:

The organizational management uses modern transport system to deliver their raw material to the manufacturing plant and manufactured products to the distributors (Imai et al., 2017).

Manufacturing:

The leaders of the organization believe in adopting modern technologies in the production process. They have implemented various modern techniques that has stimulated the production process of the organization (Lee & Strategos, 2014).

Distribution:

The organizational management of Toyota give complete freedom to their distributors to take their decision, which motivates them to maintain long-term relation with the organization. The organizational management ensures that they meet the expectation level of the consumers by distributing uninterrupted service and accurate product to their consumers (Tennert et al., 2014).

Three Major Issues of the Supply Chain of Toyota:

Although, the leaders of Toyota has designed their organizational structure in such a manner that can influence the organizational performance, there are some key issues in the supply chain that can be harmful for the organization, such as-

Reliability:

Toyota management is highly dependent on the suppliers and distributors, which can be harmful for the organizational growth. Excessive dependency on the suppliers and distributors may lead the organization towards a wrong direction.

Recommendation:

The organizational authority of Toyota must maintain contractual agreement to avoid any kind of misunderstanding and discrepancy. They must monitor the activity of the suppliers.

Expansion:

The rapid growth of Toyota has put a negative impact on the supply chain of the organization. As the organization has covered a huge geographic area, it has become very difficult for the organizational management to interact with all the suppliers.

Recommendation:

Toyota leaders must use modern communication tool to communicate with the suppliers and they must conduct meeting where they can address each of the suppliers and distributors and discuss about all the important issues related to the supply chain of the organization.

Cost:

Strong and large supply chain management may increase the production cost of the organization. It will put significant impact on the overall budget of the organization.

Recommendation:

The responsible members of Toyota who are responsible for maintaining the budget of the organization must maintain balance, so the cost of the supply chain management may not put any negative impact on the product price of the organization.

Total Quality Management Tool:

It can be seen by analysing the histogram tool that the organizational management of Toyota needs to improve their communication structure to improve their organizational service. This tool has been used to analyse the areas where the organizational management needs to put some extra effort to improve their organizational service and structure.

Just in Time Philosophy:

Just in time philosophy often used to reduce the production cost and enhance the efficiency in the production procedure (Gajewska, 2014). It puts significant impact on the various aspects of the manufacturing process and helps the organization to provide high quality service to the consumers, such as-

• It reduces the time span of the manufacturing procedure by taking efficient steps in a right time.
• It also reduces the labour cost by implementing efficient strategies in right time.
• It stimulates the production process of the organization (Suh, 2016)

Forecasting Method:

Conclusion:

As per the previous discussion, it can be concluded that the organizational leaders of Toyota as designed their organizational structure in such a manner that can be beneficial for the organization to earn long-term goal and meet the expectation level of the organization. It maintains a strong supply chain to ensure the uninterrupted flow of the raw material. However, there are some loopholes in the organizational structure that must be rectified to improve the service quality of the organization. They must maintain interactive relation with their consumers and suppliers to make sure that they are aware of the organizational strategy and policy. It will help them to relate with their internal and external stakeholders and earn the desired long-term organizational goal.  

Reference:

Chowdhury, S. D. (2014). Strategic roads that diverge or converge: GM and Toyota in the battle for the top. Business Horizons, 57(1), 127-136.

Elnaga, A. A., & Imran, A. (2014). The impact of employee empowerment on job satisfaction: theoretical study. American journal of research communication, 2(1), 13-26.

Gajewska, K. (2014). Transnational Struggle for Workers' Rights & Missing Domestic Links: The Case of Japanese Activists' Involvement in the Toyota Philippines Dispute. Global Labour Journal, 5(1).

Gilroy, S., Suzuki, N., Miller, G., Choi, W. G., Toyota, M., Devireddy, A. R., & Mittler, R. (2014). A tidal wave of signals: calcium and ROS at the forefront of rapid systemic signaling. Trends in Plant Science, 19(10), 623-630.

Imai, N. (2017). Toyota Production System for Business Process Management. Holistic Business Process Management: Theory and Practice, 14, 57.

Kumada, H., Suzuki, Y., Ikeda, K., Toyota, J., Karino, Y., Chayama, K., ... & Izumi, N. (2014). Daclatasvir plus asunaprevir for chronic HCV genotype 1b infection. Hepatology, 59(6), 2083-2091.

Lai, S. Y., Tsai, C. H., Wei, L. Y., Li, R. K., & Lu, M. J. (2015). The dilemma of Toyota Production System implementation: a case study of Taiwan machine tool industries. International Journal of Academic Research in Accounting, Finance and Management Sciences, 5(1), 1-12.

Lee, Q., & Strategos, P. E. (2014). Lean in hard times.

Suh, Y. (2016). Global Knowledge Transfer of East Asian Auto Industry: Comparative Study of Toyota and Hyundai.

Tennert, F. (2014). An attributional analysis of corporate reporting in crisis situations: The 2010 Toyota recall. Journal of Communication Management, 18(4), 422-435.

Thompson, A. (2015). Toyota’s generic strategy and intensive growth strategies. Retrieved April, 27, 2016.

toyota.com. (2017). Toyota.com. Retrieved 7 August 2017, from https://www.toyota.com