Roles of Leaders and Managers in Toyota Plc's Operations Management

This report provides a comprehensive analysis of leadership and management within Toyota Plc's operational context. It begins by defining and comparing the characteristics and roles of leaders and managers, highlighting their distinct responsibilities and contributions to organizational success. The report then examines the specific roles of leaders and the functions of managers, emphasizing their importance in driving efficiency and achieving organizational goals. It delves into various leadership theories and models, such as situational leadership and contingency theory, illustrating their practical application within Toyota. Furthermore, the report explores the roles of managers and leaders in the context of key operational management approaches, including Total Quality Management (TQM), Just-in-Time (JIT), and Continuous Improvement (Kaizen). It assesses the impact of the business environment on operational management and concludes by summarizing the key findings and insights. This report offers valuable insights into effective leadership and management practices within a major automotive company.

MANAGEMENT AND OPERATION

Contents
INTRODUCTION ...........................................................................................................................................3
TASK 1..........................................................................................................................................................3
P1 Define and compare different characteristics and roles of leader and manager ...............................3
TASK 2..........................................................................................................................................................5
P2 Examine role of Leader and functions of Manager ............................................................................5
P3 Theories and models of leadership ....................................................................................................6
TASK 3 .........................................................................................................................................................7
P4 Role of manager and leader in context of key approaches to operation management .....................7
P5 Significance and value of operation management .............................................................................8
TASK 4..........................................................................................................................................................8
P6 Asses factors within business environment that influence operational management .......................8
CONCLUSION .............................................................................................................................................9
REFERENCES ..............................................................................................................................................10

INTRODUCTION
Both Managers and Leaders are considered as the vital part of an organization who helps
in improving the overall production efficiency and development of high quality goods & services
that meets the requirement of target customer effectively (Nakayama, 2015). Operation
management is that part of business that mainly focuses on redesign business operation and
control the production of goods and services in a structured manner. It ensures that organization
should utilize the available resources in an optimum manner so as to meet the requirement of
customer effectively. It emphasize on yielding higher profits by improving the efficiency &
productivity of employees as well as organization. The company chosen for this report is
Toyota Plc which is a Japanese company that mainly deals in automobile sector. This report
covers different roles and functions of manager and leader, key approaches to operational
management, impact of business environment, leadership theories and models.
TASK 1
P1 Define and compare different characteristics and roles of leader and manager
Every great organization requires effective and successful leaders who inspire or
motivates their co-worker to reach within themselves so as to get things done in cost-effective
and timely manner. A leader is a person that holds superior position within the company and
possess high degree of control over others. Generally they are the one who interact with
followers or sub-ordinates in a manner that they want to listen and wants to get motivated.
According to O’Donnel, a successful leader is the one who has the ability to direct and monitor
group efforts towards the attainment of organizational goal.
On the other hand, Managers are responsible for administering & controlling a company
or group of employee. Basically, they are in charge of particular group or task. Managers own
control over different organizational department and guide the individuals who work for them.
According to Henry Fayol, a good manager must be able to do organizing, planning, controlling,
leading and coordinating for a particular organization (Jacobs, 2014).

Comparison between Leader and Manager
Leader Manager
They are the one who creates vision for co-
worker. They basically, draw a picture of
what they see as possible and encourage and
engage their sub-ordinates in converting that
vision into reality. They activate person to do
something bigger or become a part of some
bigger thing.
Managers are responsible for creating goals.
Their main focus is to set goals for each
department, measuring it and then finally
achieving it. They monitor situation to reach
or exceed their defined objectives.
Leaders are change agent. The success mantra
of leader is Innovation. They embrace change
and enable others as well to get themselves
change.
Managers maintains the status quo i.e. they
stick to their working system, structure,
processes.
Leaders are the one who take risk. Managers are the one who control risk.
They build strong relationship with their co-
workers.
They laid stress on building system and
processes.
Leaders are the one who guide or motivates
people towards success.
They are the one who tells people what to do.
Role & Characteristics of Leader:
1. Required at all level: Leadership is a function which is essential at all management level.
In top level, it is significant for getting co-operation in formulation of policies and plans.
In middle & lower level, it is important for interpretation and execution of programs
framed by top level.
2. Visionary: Successful Leaders are the one who lives in future state and carry a vision
along with realties of present as well. They effectively and efficiently maintain balance
between future and present goals.
3. Influential: Today we live in a world of influence not of command. Therefore, a good
leader must possess the qualities of listening rather than doing talking (Chase and
Lummus, 2016).
Role & Characteristics of Manager:
1. Performance Management: There are various aspects that manager needs to look into
such as setting goals & objectives, monitoring employee’s performance, provide
feedback, coaching, measuring, training and lastly doing performance review.
2. Team development: A good manager is accountable for the development of high
performing team. It has been believed that an interdependent team seems to be more
productive and efficient as compared to group of people who works independently.
3. Setting overall Direction: A manger is the one who sets both long and short term
direction for a team or an organization. This mainly include the goals, objective, vision,
mission and strategy.

TASK 2
P2 Examine role of Leader and functions of Manager

Role of Leader:
Leader is the one who motivates their follower to do task in a cost-effective and timely manner.
Basically it refers to the potential of leader to influence behaviour of co-worker. Following are
the roles of leader:
1. Representative of the organisation: A leader is often known as the representative of the
company. He has to represent the business concern at conference, general meetings,
seminars etc. His main role is to communicate the entity to outside public.
2. Leader solicits support: Leader is a person who invites co-operation and support of their
followers. This he can attain by his intelligence, personality, experience and maturity
which provides him positive result. Moreover, he needs to invite recommendation and
suggestion of sub-ordinates and try to possible implement them into company's program
and plans. They allow the input of employee in decision-making process which makes
them feel valued and important.
3. Integrates personal goal with organisational goals: A leader with his leadership traits or
style helps in integrating employees personal goal with that of organisational. He tries to
synchronize the efforts of personnel towards a common goal and thereby accomplish
objectives. This can only be done if he is able to influence followers and get willing
support and urge to achieve objectives.
4. As a guide, philosopher and friend: It is important for a leader to possess these traits in
him. He can be guide by communicating and supervising the workers the policies and
plans of top-management and protect their co-operation to accomplish the goals of the
concern. He can act as a friend by sharing their opinions, desire and felling with
employees. He act as a philosopher by employing his experience and intelligence and
thereby mentoring and guiding the employees when it requires.
Functions of Manager: Manager is the one who is responsible for controlling the group of staff
and an organisation. Their main functions are as follows:
1. Planning: This step deals with mapping out what exactly needs to be done so as to
achieve organisational goal. For example: The goal of Toyota is to increase is its sales.
Now the foremost role of manager is to decide the steps that are essential to achieve that
goal. These steps may involve: increasing inventory, advertising and sales staff. These
essential steps will further developed into plan. When finally the plan is made and is in
place, manager can attain their objective by simply following the plan.
2. Organizing: After the plan has been made, a manager requires to organize his team and
resources as per the plan. Granting authority and assigning work are two key elements of
organizing.
3. Leading: A manager needs to lot more than just developing plan and organizing it to
achieve goal. He must also know how to lead person. Leading includes guiding,
communicating, motivation and encouraging. Sometimes, manager needs to coach, help
and solve problem with employees.

4. Staffing: Once the manager recognize his area's needs, he further needs to determine to
beef up his staffing by hiring, selecting, training & developing workforce. A manager
who works with large organisation also contributes in their human resource department as
well so as to accomplish business goal in an effectual manner.
5. Controlling: The role of manager is yet finished. He needs to continuously keep an eye on
results against the defined objective and take corrective necessary actions to ensure that
his area's plan remains on track.
P3 Theories and models of leadership
Situational Leadership: Under this kind of leadership, leaders adjust their style according to the
skills and abilities of employees. It is up-to the leader to change their style not the follower or
sub-ordinate to adapt their style. The style may change on frequent basis so as to meet the need
of others in a business enterprise. In Toyota Plc, leaders assess the skills and competency of their
workers and motivate them in their own style. Moreover their leader adopt different leadership
style as per the requirement of situation. Currently the company is facing issues regarding
increased cost where situational leadership can play vital role in this situation. Their leader get
themselves actively involved in its day to day activities, input of followers are requested but final
decision is made by leader only.
System Leadership Theory: System leadership as applied in referred organization, the leaders
control the overall working of their followers and communicate company’s situation and make
the personnel to work as per the situation or need of the company. For example: Toyota Plc
wants to make some changes in their operation department as they want to apply KAIZEN in
their operation department, so they need to implement strategies accordingly. They needs to let
the personnel of this department to enhance activities concerned with production of cars at low
cost.
Contingency Theory: This theory focuses on the change in strategies as per the change in
situation. The leaders plays key role in which they tries to influence their followers to bring
changes in the operation so as to meet the challenge or threat, prevailing in the market in an
effective and efficient manner. The leader of Toyota examine the reason for increased cost of
production and applied the model or theory to execute some changes in their operational
activities that leads to brings down the increased or high cost of raw material and equipment
obtained from the supplier (Chen, Li and Fen, 2014). In addition to that, they change policies of
operation department as per this situation.
TASK 3
P4 Role of manager and leader in context of key approaches to operation management
Total Quality Management: It is a management approach that laid stress on achieving long term
success via customer satisfaction. All members of the company actively participate in enhancing
the product, services, processes and culture in which they work. Here the role of manage of

Toyota is to take customer review or feedback and then pass it on to production department so
that they can further produce goods as per the requirement of target audience. The role of leader
is to guide employees to fulfil their task in cost-effective & timely manner keeping in the minds
the needs of buyers as well (Lei, 2011).
Just in Time Approach: It is an inventory strategy used by business organization to maximize
their efficiency and eliminates waste by receiving products only when they are needed in
manufacturing department or demanded by potential buyers. The role of manage is to forecast
the demand accurately with the help of leaders. This approach enable manufacturers of Toyota to
easily move from one type of product to other.
Continuous Improvement: It is an ongoing effort made by business concern to improve goods,
services or processes. This is also known as KAIZEN Approach which the referred firm has
implemented in their operational department. Basically, it is a long term approach that works
systematically towards attaining small or incremental changes in the process so as to improve
overall efficiency and quality. The role of manager is to examine the need of change in different
departments and the role of leader is to give proper guidance and direction to their followers. In
addition to that, Toyota invites their managers & leaders to think about the process and frame
timely decision that aid in running smoothly and achieving overall objective in an effective
manner.
Lean Production Theory: This theory focuses on minimizing the waste within the manufacturing
department without sacrificing productivity. This theory also taken into account waste generated
through overburden, unevenness in work load. Here the role of manager is to investigate what
are the reasons that causes waste and tries to eliminate it permanently. Leaders will focus on
improving the productivity and efficiency of workers.
Six Sigma Theory: This approach emphasize on process improvement. It seek to enhance the
quality of final output by determining and eliminating the cause of defect and reducing
variability in business processes & manufacturing. Managers of referred firm play role in this
approach as they identify the factors causing defect, whereas leader focuses on finding out
among the follower who is best fitted for this approach. Manager of Toyota laid stress on
reducing process cycle time, increase customer satisfaction, increased profit and reduce cost
(Jabbari and Moghaddas, 2103).
P5 Significance and value of operation management
Operation Management refers to that management area concerned with designing and
monitoring production process and redesigning business operation in the manufacturing of goods
and services. It include the responsibility of confirming that business operations are efficient in
context of using available resources and effective in terms of fulfilling customer requirement &
desire.
Customer Satisfaction: Customers are known as the king of market. Every organization aims at
producing product or services that meets the requirement of customer in an effectual manner.
Toyota is doing the same thing. They have thoroughly researched about the likes and dislikes of
their potential customer and produce products accordingly which indirectly also aid them in
reducing waste as well (Thomson, 2015. It is important for every business concern to satisfy

their target audience in an appropriate manner as they the one who assist firm in yielding higher
profit and revenue.
Efficiency: Operation Management emphasize on aligning operation with business objective,
helping the company to go where they wants to. It also oversees inventory system that identifies
how efficiently company’s inventory is managed. Approaches of operation management such as
TQM, Six Sigma focuses on achieving organizational objective by maximizing efficiency of the
company as well as of employees. For example: Toyota was facing issue of increased cost, by
applying the approaches of operation management in their business practices they not only yield
higher profits but enlarge their market share as well.
Reduction of waste: The concept of operation management not only focuses on improving the
product, services or process but also taken into factors that causes waste in production
department and tries to reduce or eliminate it in an appropriate manner. Approaches like
KAIZEN, Lean Production aims at reducing waste without sacrificing the productivity. There are
various factors that are causing error in the production process such as unevenness in work load,
overburden etc. Thus, operation management taken into consideration such factors and tries to
remove or eliminate it from the root itself.
Effective allocation and utilization of resources: It is a systematic management approach that
mainly deals in improving the performance and final output of the company. The main focus of
operation department is to optimally use the available resources so as to avoid of the chances of
arising waste that might affect overall functioning of production department. Resources are
important for material, component, labor, equipment, financial that is needed to perform
activities related to production smoothly. The operation management enables the company to
identify and schedule resources in such a manner that leads to achieve business objective in cost-
effective and timely manner.
TASK 4
P6 Asses factors within business environment that influence operational management
Political: Toyota Plc is subject to the effects of country’s political condition. As the company
practices their business operation in many countries, this enable them to deal with varied
political parties that directly or indirectly influence its overall functioning and operation. Due to
the intervention of US government in recruitment process of a firm who is recruiting more
personnel from home nation but now companies have to stop this and needs to hire majority of
manpower from US. This enable referred firm to remove workers from job.
Economical: Economic analysis deals with economic trend and situation in home country which
include taxation, trade cycle, disposable income of consumer etc. All these factors owns either
direct or indirect influence on the revenue of company. Toyota is currently facing rising losses
because of improper structure of some of its automotives which they need to recall in large
number because of which firm is facing huge loss. However these economic factors have
contributed maximum for the changes that takes place in HR policy due to this. With recent
recession, Toyota have changed themselves and their policies a lot so as to cope with the

prevailing or current market situation in the marketplace (Becerick, 2011). Factors such as
consumer demand, inflation rate, GDP rate & disposable income possess major influence on the
HR policy of referred firm.
Technological: This framework includes competing technology development, replacement
technologies, innovation, maturity of technology etc. Technological investment made by referred
firm is quite huge as they are always known for its technological innovation initiatives, research
funding, replacement mechanism etc. However, the large investment made by Toyota in this
context give rise to certain risk and fears that may have an adverse impact on company’s
operation and function. The technological environment is changing is so rapidly that it becomes
difficult for the company to launch or deign new product on frequent basis. But to deal with this
situation, Toyota is promoting different training programs among workers that abreast them with
latest technology,
CONCLUSION
As per the above mentioned report, it can be concluded that both manager and leader play
significant role in achieving organizational objective. Manager is responsible for carrying out
activities in an effective and efficient manner whereas Leader laid stress on providing guidance
and direction to its followers. Therefore, role and responsibilities of both are linked with each
other. Approaches of operational management aid in removing the error occurs in production
department that adversely impact functioning and operation of company. Value and importance
of operation management aid in yielding higher profits and revenues. Further both internal and
external factors that influence operational management is also discussed in this report that needs
to be taken into account by manager of a firm so as to accomplish their goals effectively.

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