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Chapter 7
Involvement
What a terrible waste of humanity.
Taiichi Ohno
Just as the wind brings a splendid sailboat to life, total involvement animates
the Toyota system. Involvement should be managed as intensely as produc-
tion and quality. As we expanded at Toyota Cambridge we learned to ask
questions such as
◾ How will we involve our team members?
◾ What skills will they need to become involved?
◾ How will we support and sustain involvement?
◾ How will we measure involvement?
◾ What is the role of management?
These questions informed our culture strategy.
Why Involvement?
It took me a while to grasp the importance of involvement, raised as I was ...