Why Toyota Is Afraid Of Being Number One
In this Business Week piece about Toyota's fear of a backlash against them, with their continued success, there was this tidbit I found interesting:
“That same year [as NUMMI opened], a Ron Howard comedy called Gung Ho
appeared; it contrasted the American and Japanese work ethic at a car plant operated by an Asian company called Assan Motors. (Toyota later used the film as an example of how not to manage Americans.)”
Who knew?
Please scroll down (or click) to post a comment. Connect with me on LinkedIn.
Let’s work together to build a culture of continuous improvement and psychological safety. If you're a leader looking to create lasting change—not just projects—I help organizations:
- Engage people at all levels in sustainable improvement
- Shift from fear of mistakes to learning from them
- Apply Lean thinking in practical, people-centered ways
Interested in coaching or a keynote talk? Let’s start a conversation.
[…] story reminds me of fictional, comic tensions in the movie “Gung Ho” about a Japanese company buying an American car plant. That movie came out in 1984, the same […]
[…] filme para quem quer saber como não se impor uma cultura corporativa. É tão importante que a Toyota utiliza o filme Fábrica de Loucuras até hoje nos treinamentos dos seus executivos como forma de mostrar como não gerenciar […]