A speech by teruyuki-minoura, Toyota's managing director of global purchasing, at the 2003 Automotive Parts System Solution Fair in Tokyo. One of the most important practitioner accounts of TPS philosophy from a senior Toyota executive.
Key Arguments
Minoura's central thesis: the "T" in TPS stands for "Thinking" as well as "Toyota." TPS is not a set of tools but a thinking system that develops people's problem-solving capabilities.
He emphasizes that there can be no successful monozukuri (making things) without hito-zukuri (making people). This people-development dimension — training workers to think scientifically about their work — is what makes TPS sustainable and what most Western lean implementations miss.
Minoura traces the origin of just-in-time to the 1950 labor dispute at Toyota, arguing that the economic crisis forced Toyota to develop a system of producing "only what's needed and transferring only what's needed."
Significance
The speech bridges the gap between TPS as described by academics and consultants and TPS as practiced by Toyota insiders. Minoura's emphasis on "thinking" over "tools" anticipates Mike Rother's toyota-kata framework by six years.