The Rise Of The Grandson

Akio Toyoda is the grandson of Toyota Motor’s founder. He was born on May 3, 1956 in Nagoya, Japan. Unlike older generations of Japanese executives he has more exposure to Western culture. He obtained his MBA degree at Babson College in the U.S. Akio also worked for some time at a U.S. firm.

Like his grandfather and father he too would head Toyota Motor one of the largest automobile companies in the world.  Akio joined the company in 1984. He then joined the company’s board of directors in 2000 and by 2005 was appointed executive vice president.  In June 2009 Akio became the new president of Toyota Motor; there were also four new executive vice presidents and eight new board members.

The tenure of Akio has not been easy.  In fact it has truly tested his leadership skill and his fortitude. There was the 2009 acceleration pedal recall. There was the earthquake and tsunami in Japan in 2011 followed months later by the floods in Thailand which all contributed to supply disruption.

He is now leading be being in front literally. He is the company pitchman and appears on advertisement and getting media mileage where he can to improve the company image. This has not only been for the sake of getting more customers to buy cars but for the morale of company employees as well.

Some have criticized Toyota’s bland and unexciting designs. Korean car companies have also become more popular in America.  Akio has been more personal in his approach to turn things.  In fact he is even more involved in the development of cars like the FR-S sports car which he drove every month during its development period and gave his feedbacks about it.

He is present in auto shows and racing events even participating in them briefly. His personal approach has been a big gamble, if the company doesn’t deliver on certain promises he would more likely take the hit.  It seems to pay paying off though as Toyota recently overtook Volkswagen to once again become the largest automaker in terms of revenue.