Toyota's Reputation, Akio Toyoda
Akio Toyoda faces a hard task of trying to bring out a good reputation to the Toyota car maker. The reputation Toyota had gained because of the quality of their products made them rank number 17 in a reputation study, and they were the highest ranking in all the other automakers (Davis 2012). The blow based on reputation was very damaging (Costea 2010). The first thing Toyota should have done is to clarify any point that the consumer needed to know more about the problem that had caused the recalling of cars.
Toyota actually did this right as good management would do. They came up with a way to confront the criticism put forward and to respond to any questions and points that needed clarification to the consumer. Their strategy to handle all the inquisitions was through social media using Social Digs, Twitter and Facebook (Toyota 2009).
The next step would be to immediately identify where they had gone wrong during the production that affected the quality of the final product. Somewhere along the line of production an error must have occurred to cause the problem that would come to affect the quality and thus damage the reputation of Toyota (Ohnsman and Kitamura 2010). After performing this review and identifying where the production had gone wrong, they should have mended that loophole.
[...] The company should also have set up regional technical offices to help evaluate the cars needed to recall. In 2009, they had to recall entire shipments of cars. There was no evaluation on the status of the car regionally, which led to massive recalling. Analysis at a regional level would have reduced the number of cars being taken back to the company greatly by solving some of the technical issues regionally. The Toyota has raised its reputation since the 2009 crisis, and it was rated at number 74 as of 2012 (Davis 2012). [...]
[...] Cost leadership has also been implemented in Toyota so that they can eliminate waste in the production system. This will lead to low prices in the commodity. Low prices have led to the Toyota brand domination of the car market. Another focus for Toyota is to produce products with a unique brand. This is the strategy of differentiation that Toyota has employed to make its products differentiable in the market from all other car brands. References Costea, A Toyota gained a bad reputation among US customers [Online]. [...]
[...] Restoring Toyota's Reputation What should Akio Toyoda do now to restore Toyota's reputation and position Toyota for sustainable competitive advantage? Akio Toyoda faces a hard task of trying to bring out a good reputation to the Toyota car maker. The reputation Toyota had gained because of the quality of their products made them rank number 17 in a reputation study, and they were the highest ranking in all the other automakers (Davis 2012). The blow based on reputation was very damaging (Costea 2010). [...]
[...] Available at [Accessed 12 November 2013]. Davis, S Toyota: from recalls to relevance. Forbes [Online]. Available at [Accessed 12 November 2013]. Kaufman, W Can Toyota recover its reputation for quality? [Online]. Available at [Accessed 12 November 2013]. Ohnsman, A. and Kitamura, M Is Toyota's reputation finished? Bloomberg Businessweek [Online]. Available at [Accessed 12 November 2013]. Anon Toyota and the emerging challenges of global reputation management. [...]
[...] Reputation Point [Online]. Available at [Accessed 12 November 2013]. Toyota The right way forward. Annual report 2009 [Online]. Available at [Accessed 12 November 2013]. Toyota Launching a new structure. Annual report 2013 [Online]. Available at [Accessed 12 November 2013]. [...]
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