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What really tripped up Toyota?
By Lauren | February 16, 2010
Seems as though almost everyone who writes about business has a theory about what landed Toyota in its current fix. Some pundits blame a failure of leadership in Toyota’s management, others claim that Toyota failed to stay true to its brand, and still others tag Toyota with the arrogance that comes from being a superstar for too long. They probably all have a point, but I think Toyota’s woes may be most attributable to one simple failing:
Toyota appears to have forgotten that product safety has to come first.
Every one of the quality control issues that led Toyota to issue three separate recalls is directly related to safety - they all have to do with how reliably Toyota cars accelerate and brake. Above all else, consumers want to be sure that the cars they buy are safe to drive. Fuel efficiency, styling and price are important too, but their importance vanishes the instant that a concern about product safety rears its ugly head. Once an automaker knows it has sold potentially unsafe cars to the public, it has to work at warp speed to address the situation if it wants to maintain customer trust.
And that, I believe, is where Toyota went wrong. As soon as the automaker knew that some of its cars were potentially unsafe, it should have recalled and fixed them. However, although it reportedly may have known for days, weeks or even longer that there were safety concerns with some of its cars, Toyota apparently dragged its feet on a recall. That sent a clear but unfortunate message that Toyota was more concerned about its own bottom line than the health and safety of its customers. And once that message got out, Toyota’s goose was cooked.
Can Toyota recover? Probably - but it’ll take a whole lot of apologies and solid proof that the company takes safety seriously to put things right again.
Topics: Apologies, Business Ethics, business communications, corporate responsibility, customer relations, ethics |
February 16th, 2010 at 11:09 pm
Lauren,
Styling and other issues do not mean a great deal if drivers are not satisfied about safety concerns. For most drivers, their own safety as well as that of their family will always be more important than style, comfort or other considerations.
Toyota has lost the trust of the general public - it will take years to rebuild its reputation.