Toyota Knowledge Management Case Study

In order to manage knowledge successfully, it is essential to clarify the essence of knowledge before identifying the importance of knowledge management. The perception of knowledge has been varied broadly; however, one of the generally accepted defintion is from Davenport and Prusak (1998). According to their points of view, knowledge is defined as a set of experience and values, it either comes from individuals ' mind or roots in the organisation, which can be found in the documents, routines, practices and norms, and is assumed to flow between individuals through various networks, being used to assess and embody new

Knowledge is considered as one of the most important and competitive resource for sustenance of the organisation (Zack, 1999). It can be compared to the strategic resource that can be used and applied in various frames of the organisation. Experienced managers in the organisations believe that company can receive strategic advantage through knowledge and not the strategies or actions implemented by competitors. Knowledge can be regarded as a strong approach that opens numerous ways of success. It is that weapon that help organisation to evaluate solutions in financial and other professional difficulties.

The case describes the details about the production process of Toyota and the principles they are following, like JIT & Jidoka in Toyota Production System (TPS), heijunka & kaizen. How they have control the cost, maintain quality through process

This is one of the major problems in any organization. Nobody is accountable if a group task is not done as everyone in the group is responsible. Toyota also faced the same behaviour in its employees. To avoid this tendency the company launched its own problem-solving process based on Toyota Business Practices (TBP). It helped to examine what the problems were what role the team or organization had played in causing or failing to address the problem. It also suggested what the team or organization can do to contribute to a solution to the problem that will take the company

This chapter describes what is knowledge management in details as well as what is the factors of implementing knowledge management which are implementing best practices, network expansion, systematic information system infrastructure, good organizational culture, senior management leadership and commitment and trustworthiness of teamwork.

Knowledge management was defined as the turning of information into actionable knowledge which can be accessed by people who can apply it. Robbins (2003) gives a time perspective in his definition of knowledge management. He mentions as part of knowledge management the distribution of the right information to the right people at the right time. Lytras et al (2002) gives a definition of knowledge management which emphasises the purpose of knowledge management. In the definition creation of new capabilities, enablement for superior performance, encouraging innovation and enhancement of customer value were mentioned. For the purpose of this study the researcher summarised knowledge management as the intentional process of coordinating people, technology and systems to optimise creation and sharing of intellectual

The superior capabilities of knowledge management systems provide an opportunity for the business to engage the most effective components and recognize the importance of communication to make informed, accurate decisions (McGrath, 2001). This system can organize the company’s knowledge resources, knowledge obtaining, organizing, and applying to make a sound routine the will enforce effectiveness (Niu, 2008). The dynamic function of knowledge management to create, capture, and apply knowledge to achieve an organization’s objective will allow them to be more profitable and successful (Zucker, 1986). In addition to increasing profits, the system can be also used to reduce costs and enhance research and development (DeTienne & Jackson, 2001). With all of these advantages, it would be wasteful for a company to not employ knowledge management. As seen in the Discovery Communications, Inc. example, the company can attribute their new productivity levels and increase in ease of securing documents to the knowledge management system that put into place by Carefree Technology. Like Discovery Communications, Inc., knowledge management is so popular today because companies can collect, process and share knowledge to ignite employees ' creativity which in turn will make the business grow. Wenhong and Jianhua (2009) explained the core of knowledge management is to convert company’s knowledge resources into an increased company

The trucking industry describes knowledge management components very precisely. In describing each phase rather it be (1) Data (2) Information (3) Tribal knowledge (4) Knowledge management (5) Knowledge Based decision making, each one plays an integral part around increasing quality & performances. Throughout trucking, there are always continuous growth and improvement within our industry. There are various departments within the company that mission is to find new, innovation to help improve trucking. The company (Swift) has developed an infrastructure, which allows various methods to improve customer and driver experience. Each phase of the knowledge management cycle looks to enhance and improve strategic solutions for efficiency.

While Knowledge Management (KM) is important in any business however, there is no real agreed upon definition. KM is a concept that includes the

In today 's high competitive business world, success is dependent on how efficiently and effectively an organization can develop and utilize its information and knowledge resources(Carlsson etc, 2002). Therefore, there are many dispute on information and knowledge management. The purpose of this essay is to discuss the relationship between Information management(IM) and knowledge management(KM), then argument about whether KM is important for an organization. In order to make sure essay have a clear structure, this essay main divided into four parts (from Part 2 to Part5 ): Part 2 will introduce what is IM and KM, the benefits of IM and KM, the relationships amongst data, information and knowledge, and then this paper will introduce the relationship between IM and KM; Part 3 will analysis case study of good knowledge management in Xerox company; Part 4 will analysis case study of bad knowledge management in NASA; Part 5, this essay will give an argument result to you in conclusion.

Toyota Motor Corporation is the largest automobile manufacturer in the world. The company’s success revolves around its high quality automobiles that are sold at competitive prices. In addition to quality and price, Toyota is well acknowledged for its knowledge sharing culture as a crucial reason for its success. In the article “The Toyota way of global knowledge creation the ‘learn local, act global’ strategy” we are introduced to several different approaches of knowledge management practices that Toyota has developed over the years. Through these practices they were able create and share knowledge for further growth and success internally and externally—subsidiaries and a joint venture

Intellectual capital is the combined knowledge of employees within an organization (Intellectual, 2013). This knowledge is to add value to the organization in ways such as increase profits, provide products or services to customers, gain competitive advantage, improve processes, or other types of capital. This paper will show five different types of intellectual capital that adds value to an organization. It will provide examples of each intellectual capital, whether that capital is identifiable or unidentifiable as an asset, and how each provides value to the organization.

With the benefit of hindsight, it is apparent that in the knowledge era, creating and leveraging knowledge is the business of business. By all available measures, the stock market is already providing handsome rewards to companies that successfully leverage their knowledge--a phenomenon that will almost surely grow in significance as knowledge-based organizations increase in size and number. A number of firms are anticipating this and looking to knowledge management to enhance, measure, and manage the knowledge of their employees and organizations more effectively.

Within the Army organizations of today knowledge management plays a huge role in the dissemination of information to the unit and it’s soldiers. This is no different for the aviation unit in which I operate. This information can be found in FM 6-01.1, Knowledge Management Operations. It defines knowledge management as the process of enabling knowledge flow to enhance shared understanding, learning, and decision-making. But when the unit was surveyed about their understanding of knowledge management the results were surprising.

The company's best-known hardware products are Macintosh computers, the iPod and the iPhone. Apple software have the Mac OS X operating system, the iTunes media browser, the iLife suite of multimedia and editing software, the iWork suite of productivity software, and Final Cut Studio, a suite of professional visual and movie-industry software products. Apple Inc. operates more than 250 retail stores in nine countries and an online store where hardware and software products are sold. Apple established in Cupertino, California on April 1, 1976 and incorporated January 3, 1977, the company was called "Apple Computer, Inc." for its first 30 years, but dropped the word "Computer" on January 9, 2007 to reflect the company's ongoing expansion into the consumer electronics market in addition to its traditional focus on personal computers.