Standardization as an Enabler
The critical task when implementing standardization is to find that balance between providing employees with rigid procedures to follow and providing the freedom to innovate and be creative to meet ch...
Standardized Tasks Are the Foundation
Standardizing Work for a New Product Launch
The Toyota Way of handling the chaos of getting an army of people involved in creating and launching a new vehicle is to standardize the work in a balanced way that doesn’t give complete control to an...
Coercive vs. Enabling Bureaucracies-Employee Empowerment
Under Taylor’s (1947) scientific management, workers were viewed as machines who needed to be made as efficient as possible through the manipulations of industrial engineers and autocratic managers. T...
The Principle: Standardization Is the Basis for Continuous Improvement and Quality
Toyota’s standards have a much broader role than making shop floor workers’ tasks repeatable and efficient. The Toyota Way results in standardized tasks throughout the company’s white-collar work proc...