Every day goes by, and it seems that a new Toyota drama series is exposed, which makes the “Will Toyota Survive” question relevant. For instance a recent article Toyota Recall Class-Action Suits Could Cost The Automaker $3 Billion delves into the potential costs if class-action suits are accepted by the courts. It states,
Such class-action lawsuits “are more scary for Toyota than the cases where people actually got injured,” said Tom Baker, a University of Pennsylvania law professor. “A super-big injury case would be $20 million. But you could have millions of individual car owners who could (each) be owed $1,000. If I were Toyota, I’d be more worried about those cases.”
The AP conducted an extensive review of federal court filings and uncovered a total of 89 class-action lawsuits filed nationwide as of Monday.
Then on Monday, March 8, while Toyota is declaring that electronics is not the cause of unintended acceleration, a Prius owner/driver calls 911 in California reporting he is at the wheel of a runaway car. The driver even states that he reached down with his hand, physically pulling the gas pedal back to no avail. He states that he will never drive that car again.
As each of these stories unfold, they add to the fodder of a great company gone bad. For close to two months now - its been front page news. How is Toyota reacting to their problem? Toyota is planning on turning up the volume by going on the offensive. It is going to change the story from “fear of driving” back to the “passion of driving and the passion for the Toyota brand.” And this is where the story could get interesting. Michael Rose pens an interesting article, Toyota: Learning the Wrong Lessons? Rose presents the interesting parallels between GM in the 80s and 90s, to what Toyota is doing today. And we all know what happened to GM and its slide from stardom lasting over 20 years.He closes the article,
Harry Pearce staved off the attack on GM with his public relations sleight of hand that demolished the opponents. However, the company didn’t use its reprieve to fix its problems.
If it turns out that Toyota is just embracing the lessons of the old GM and its troubles keep simmering long enough, there might be a glimmer of hope for the former big three that are now producing vehicles that actually do rival the competition.
The future of Toyota lies in the hands of Toyota. What did they learn, if anything? Will they change the culture inside Toyota, so it more closely resembles the culture inside their assembly plants? Will they quit blaming and start owning the problem? Will they learn from their mistakes?
My guess is, Toyota will survive. However, whether or not Toyota thrives is a different question. For Toyota to thrive, it will have to show the world it deserves their trust, and to achieve this, Toyota will have to change their ways. And as we have come to learn, this is very difficult to achieve in the Japanese culture.
A case in point is Toyota, a firm I’ve written about several times. Last weeks Economist, the front cover title was, 
If you were to look up the term Silent Problem, the iconic symbol for GM would be there. Over the past 30+ years, GM has been a company where culture trumped everything. Well last week, GM finally took a couple baby steps to shake up the team, and hopefully begin to change the culture. A report over at Bloomberg titled, 
The “Too Big To Fail” debate has been rampant for well over a year now as institutions like GM, CitiGroup, AIG,Chrysler and numerous others have essentially failed, only to be rescued by the US Government. Lack of leadership. Ineffective risk management. Rogue teams with few controls. Bloated cost structures. These are a few of the reasons why they failed. But what isn’t being offered up as a reason is this:
The other day I was at a medical clinic when the nurse walked into the waiting room and announced that is was “Mr. Madoff’s” turn to see the doctor. I’m certain it wasn’t “the real famous Mr. Madoff,” since he is currently serving time at a correctional facility in the Carolinas. However, I thought to myself, “Bummer of a birthmark, Mr. Madoff.” This sparked a stream of thoughts as relates to silent problems and birthmarks. For instance:
My second car was a dark blue, 1967 Tempest. Nothing special. Cloth bench seats. A small V-8 engine. Pretty plain-jane kind of car, but is was fairly good transportation. My funny GM starts here. One winter evening I was participating in a progressive supper with my youth group. It was snowing lightly, so the roads were a bit slick. As we traveled from one country destination to another, I slowed down and stopped at a STOP sign. A friend of mine was following when he hit a slick spot on the road and nudged me from behind. The right rear tail light was busted. But what made this experience memorable was the name change my car incurred that evening. The bump also broke the Tempest nameplate on the trunk, with the “Tem” falling off. The “pest” survived. From that day forward, my car was referred to as “the pest.”