THE QUESTION
Toyota: The mighty falling?
Toyota, the company renown for its quality control and continuous improvement, now finds itself having to recall millions of cars for defects. In your experience, what are the common mistakes leaders make that cause their organizations to lose their key competitive advantage?
Posted by Steve Pearlstein and Raju Narisetti on February 11, 2010 9:46 AM
FROM THE PANEL
Failing its own test
Toyota failure stems from not meeting the standards it had set for itself.
Posted by Coro Fellows, on February 11, 2010 1:24 PM
Why CEOs fail: the Toyota edition
Good organizations can juggle many priorities of course but if the senior team does not follow through on these priorities, that is, doing what they say they will do, things fall apart.
Posted by John Baldoni, on February 11, 2010 10:42 AM
Forgetting greatness
The fatal mistake I have seen leaders make is when they lose the clear purpose that made them great.
Posted by Michael Maccoby, on February 11, 2010 10:20 AM
Painfully simple failure
Toyota's leaders forget to obsessively remind their people about what's important: safety and reliability.
Posted by Warren Bennis, on February 11, 2010 10:01 AM
Flunking crisis management 101
Although the tenets of good crisis management are widely known -- communicate early and often -- there is little sign the Toyota CEO scrambled the planes in time.
Posted by Benjamin W. Heineman, Jr., on February 11, 2010 9:56 AM
Save & Share:
boleson02: Arrogance and complacency...
leybrabear: GREED. Pure unmitigated greed which they admitted to by saying one ongoing pursuit of a company is always to increase profits. How do com...
oracle2world: Good question. The people at the top of the food chain can stack the deck, and they STILL fail.
My theory? That story of the "Emperor has...
