Sharing Ideas to Find Better Ways of Doing Things

Our years of manufacturing experience have taught us that small improvements can make a big difference — and our team members across North America use this philosophy to find better ways of doing things each day. Over time, we've learned that this approach can help other organizations, too.

For over 30 years, we've shared our knowledge — known as the Toyota Production System (TPS)  with other manufacturers, non-profits and community organizations to enable them to develop better ways of doing their day-to-day work. Together, we find solutions that make them more productive, maximize available resources, improve quality, safety, and speed.  We define TPS as an organizational culture of highly engaged people solving problems or innovating to drive performance.

Sharing our ideas this way makes it possible for our partners stay competitive and preserve jobs or support more people in need — and that benefits all of us.

Our partners are most often small to mid-sized American companies as well as non-profits and community organizations involved in disaster recovery, hunger relief and healthcare. Click here to see a few examples of what we've accomplished together.

When our partners tell us about their challenges, we don't know all the answers right away. What we do know is that we have to roll up our sleeves and meet them on the "shop floor" to learn more. This gives us an up-close look at how they operate so we can work together to find solutions. Once our partners learn our approach, we encourage them to make it their own and use it every day.

We're always excited to have businesses and non-profits invite us to work with them. If you're interested in partnering with us or just want to learn more about our approach, please contact us here.

Jamie Bonini
TSSC President

What is TSSC?

The Toyota Production System Support Center (TSSC) is a not-for-profit corporation affiliated with Toyota Motor Engineering & Manufacturing North America, Inc., headquartered in Plano, Texas.

Started in 1992 and celebrating 30 years in 2022, Toyota has shared its know-how gained from years of its auto-making experience with over 500 small to mid-sized manufacturers, government entities and non-profits involved in disaster recovery, hunger relief, healthcare and more.  Based on the philosophies of the Toyota Production System, Toyota collaborates with these organizations to help them become more productive, maximize available resources and improve quality and safety.

We recognize that sharing our knowledge this way helps our partners stay competitive and preserve jobs — or help more people in need — and that benefits us all. TSSC’s 15 full-time advisors travel weekly throughout North America and execute 50 projects annually. We also believe that this is good for our business because what we learn from our partners helps us better serve all of our customers.

To learn more about us and what we do, please view our video, “Meet TSSC.”

The Toyota Production System

The Toyota Production System — also known as TPS — is an organizational culture that engages people to continuously make improvements. This culture is created and sustained by three integrated elements:

1) Toyota’s Philosophy

Toyota’s philosophy includes:

• Customer First: Provide customers with what they want, when they want it and in the amount they want it.
• People are the Most Valuable Resource: Deeply respect, engage and develop people.
• Continuous Improvement: Engage everyone each and every day.
• Shop Floor Focus: Go to where the work is done to find and solve problems.

2) TPS Tools & Practices

Use appropriate TPS Tools and Practices to achieve:

• Just-in-Time production practices.
• Built-in Quality (Jidoka) to expose roadblocks to improving safety, quality, cost and lead time.

3) Managerial Role

• Leaders inspire and develop people to surface and solve problems to improve performance.

See examples of TPS in action by visiting our projects page here.

To learn about TPS please watch the video below.