Individual assignment

1. SCHOOL OF ARCHITECTURE, BUILDING AND
DESIGN
BACHELOR OF QUANTITY SURVEYING (HONOURS)
PEOPLE DYNAMICS IN MALAYSIAN ORGANIZATIONS
(UCM60303U3)
INDIVIDUAL TASK (CASE STUDY)
NAME: LOH MUN TONG
STUDENT ID: 0323680
TUTORIAL SESSION: GROUP 3
LECTURER: MS. SHANTHI BAVANI V RAJA MOHAN
SUBMISSION DATE: 25 APRIL 2017

2. 1. Discuss how Toyota can train its employees to shape team behaviour and emphasise
teamwork throughout the organisation.
Toyota can train its employees to shape team behavior by conducting frequent team
meetings to discuss the ways to adopt the target behaviors. However, the main purpose of the
meeting is not to come up with a plan to identify needed changes but to decide on a course of
action for all members to follow. In this way, team members could voice out their opinions
and exchange thoughts with others group members. Team meeting could help to strengthen
teamwork and implementing communicate strategies at the same time.
In addition, investing in building and maintaining social relationships throughout the
organization could produce complex collaborative teams which perform in a productive and
innovative manner. As an example, the CEO of Royal Bank of Scotland, Fred Goodwin, had
invested 350 million in opening a new headquarters building which allows more than 3000
people outside Edinburgh in 2005. The purpose of building is to improve communication,
increase the exchange of ideas, and create a sense of community among employees. Thus, the
Royal Bank of Scotland teams had a very strong social relationship which serves as a solid
basis for collaborative activity that allowed the tasks to be accomplished quickly. Effective
team-building exercises can be targeted to sharpen team behavior and to improve the aspect
of team performance such as communication, problem-solving solving or creativity. Games
and drills are an effective way to bring people together to build relationships, boost morale
and promote understanding of interests, personalities, strengths and weaknesses. Therefore,
Toyota could encourage their employees to engage in more social activities by organizing
activities such as monthly party, weekly draws and workplace awards. In this way, team
behavior can be sharpened when workers know more about each other and are comfortable
discussing a variety of issues.
To sharpen up the team behavior of the team, Toyota motor corporation must be
assured that each team member in a group must be clear about their own roles in a project.
The team members could work among themselves to outline skill sets and deadline charts. By
this. the team members could delegate responsibilities as per their respective strengths and
abilities to perform in the project.

3. Next, Toyota Motor Corporation could invest in their employees’ skills and expertise
in the field. For instance, the organization could support their employees through conference,
seminars, coaching, mentoring to empower team behavior. When an employee is well
equipped with the needed skills and knowledge in their field, the employee will be motivated
to perform better in the team as high ability and motivation can result in high performance. A
team which is highly motivated to actively participate can contribute to a business’ success.
From the article, Toyota emphasis on teamwork by emphasizing on collectivism
where the orientation of the group members is going towards a similar set of goals and for
their mutual wellbeing as a team. Studies have proven that collectivistic values could
reinforce cooperative goals and an open-minded discussion of views which in turn of strong
relationships and increases team productivity.
How well do you work with others? One of the hiring exercises which practice by the
Toyota corporation is to put 12 people who had not meet each other previously to solve a
given problem as a team. The exercise claims to portray one’s personality traits and responses
to ideas offered up by others and it could help the assessors to see if they could work
effectively with people who had different personalities. This competency is an essential key
component rooted deeply with the Toyota Motor Corporation where the corporation believes
that every team members play a vital part in the team.
(603 words)

4. 2. In your opinion, analyse if Toyota has succeeded because of its team-oriented culture
or it could have succeeded without it.
In my opinion, team-oriented culture is the main key to Toyota’s success. Practicing
team-oriented culture in the workplace enables the company and the staff to become more
familiar with each other and learn to achieve the organization’s goals together. It is
undeniable that teamwork is prominent to the success of the company and to the development
of each employee. There are a few benefits of practicing team-oriented culture that lead to the
growth of the organization policies geared toward encouraging team growth in the workplace.
First, each team members in a team understand clearly of their respective strengths
and weaknesses to work well together. The benefit of strong teamwork in a workplace is that
team leaders and the team members become proficient at delegating their tasks and roles so
that the job is done by the most suitable or qualified people. If a team lack of team spirit, it
will be difficult for the managers and superiors to determine which staff members can best
achieve their tasks.
An organization which works in groups and teams develop a more systematic and
efficient system for them to complete their job tasks. A well-trained and efficient team can
assure that the job tasks can be completed on time and accurately thus increases the
organization’s productivity by taking up more projects. In addition, it also produces more
revenue without adding the number of staff. A more efficient team can be formed when
different department work together because each team has their own abilities and the groups
can work together effectively as compared to disjointed groups of employees who could not
cooperate with each other.

5. There’s a Chinese proverb goes: “two heads are better than one”, which implies that
joint effort can help to solve big problems. When company issues arise, teams in the
organization will meet to discuss the solution of the problem. The staff members will be more
comfortable in offering suggestions and share their thoughts when a team works well together
and therefore the organization benefits from vary information that come from effective teams.
Besides, the strong bonds between the team members could act as a shield when they
face a particularly difficult challenge or if the team is facing the loss of team members while
still need to maintain productivity. A strong team bond creates a support mechanism for staff
members to face challenges each day in the workplace, also, the team members could drive
each other to enhance their performance and work together in developing the organization.
Working in a team could allow positive competition among the team members which
lead to the growth of the company. Teamwork allows the worker to observe how other
members perform in their job and can potentially be a source of inspiration to others. The
senior-level team could help the less experienced workers to learn and grow by giving them
proper guidance, suitable mentor and coach them in certain projects. A greater quality or
quantity of product or service can be produced when there are more opportunities to learn
from each other’s strengths and motivates the team to perform better.
Lastly, showcase of strengths is not the only importance of working as a team, but
also allow the employees to compensate their weaker areas as there is always rooms for
improvement. The teams can tackle areas where they are weaker to perform better for the
next project. In addition, it will also help to produce stronger and more skilled teams, as the
employees could use the teamwork opportunity to improve across the board.
(589 words)

6. References
Richardson, T., August 23, 2013 | 1 Comment, June 24, 2013 | 9 Comments, November 21,
2013 | 9 Comments, Richardson, E. R., June 28, 2016 | 1 Comment, . . . December 17, 2013 |
2 Comments. (n.d.). The Thinking Behind Toyota's Hiring Process. Retrieved April 24, 2017,
from https://www.lean.org/LeanPost/Posting.cfm?LeanPostId=145
Writer, L. G. (2011, July 22). Five Ways to Improve Teamwork in the Workplace. Retrieved
April 24, 2017, from http://smallbusiness.chron.com/five-ways-improve-teamwork-
workplace-13766.html
Writer, L. G. (2011, August 29). How to Build Strong Teamwork. Retrieved April 24, 2017,
from http://smallbusiness.chron.com/build-strong-teamwork-20768.html
Erickson, L. G. (2016, November 15). Eight Ways to Build Collaborative Teams. Retrieved
April 24, 2017, from https://hbr.org/2007/11/eight-ways-to-build-collaborative-teams
5 Ways to Foster Increased Team Collaboration. (2015, August 31). Retrieved April 24,
2017, from https://www.emergenetics.com/blog/team_collaboration/
The importance of teamwork (Article). (n.d.). Retrieved April 24, 2017, from
http://www.derekstockley.com.au/news-07/090-importance-teamwork.html