Frugality, the Toyota Way might save the Auto Industry

As the economic crisis goes deeper and deeper not even shwoing signs of being near the bottoming out phase, the perils of the automobile industry might be resolve by bringing in the experts from Toyota.

Back in the days when Toyota was branding their ways to have a world class image, big names in the US auto industry just smiled and raised eyebrows. True or not? This was because Toyota is a true emblem of 'frugality" meaning small but thinking big which was not the way the original capitalist' lessons learned from the industrial age emperors.

I remember way back then in the 90's when some of it's locations were still turning lights off to save on electricity. But at the same their team of engineers were so detailed on looking at reingineering all the process of production.

Looking back from lessons learned, the automotive industry were a major source of employment for the working class because of the unique and distinct special skills and talents of it's workforce. So as we address the problem of this industry coming from an outsiders perspective, productivity and frugality might just be the saving grace after all.

What do I mean by this? Let's look back during the old days when the metal parts steel and the motor of a car were manually installed using one's working hands. Part of the problem in technology is that sometimes we can get so engrossed with it that we forget about some human aspects like personalization.

Do we really need all the high tech equipments that needs to upgrading each month? As we eliminate manual labor and invest on machinery, had we made real competitive assumptions that if we had another human body in the production line, will it be really a cost savings factor in the long run?

It's just like customer service business, unless your business model is entirely e-commerce driven you better have the same level of service to sustain the service provider's advertising about being personal to your client's needs.

Sometimes, economics is such an extensive subject matter to debate on. But in the end it boils down to common sense and the basic law of supply and demand. Just maybe the so called

auto czar

needed during the recessionary period, is a skilled technical expert. In short, the auto industry needs a working class mechanic who knows how to build and assemble cars the old fashion way but one that is open towards re-engineering technologies and of course don't forget the word "entrepreneurial".

www.alexdeleonesguerra.com