How to Change a Culture: Lessons From NUMMI

GM and Toyota launched their joint auto plant where GM’s work force had been at its worst. Here’s what happened next. And why.

In Spring 2010, New United Motor Manufacturing Inc., the famed joint venture experiment by Toyota Motor Corp. and General Motors Co., will close its doors. As someone who was there at its launch and witnessed a striking story of phenomenal company culture reinvention, I am often asked: “What did you really do to change the culture at NUMMI so dramatically, so quickly?”

I could answer the question from high altitude by simply saying, “We instituted the Toyota production and management systems.” But in the end that doesn’t explain much. A better way ...

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