The Quality Crisis and Response at Hyundai and Toyota Motor

Purpose: This study compares quality crisis and management at Hyundai Motor in the late 1990s and Toyota Motor in the late 2000s. We can expect to induce more meaningful policy implications in quality management from this in-depth comparative case study. Methods: This study compares two cases at Hyundai and Toyota Motor how to overcome quality crisis based on the OESP (Organization-Environments-Strategy- Performance) model. Results: Hyundai Motor shows centralized approach based on the asymmetric organizational culture and the entrepreneurial leadership but Toyota shows decentralized, systematic approach based on the steady state leadership and symmetric organizational culture. The CEO's leadership have proved to be one of the important factors at both companies. Conclusion: The effective quality management in global contexts has become more and more difficult for the ‘complexity explosions ’ in automobile industry. As a consequence, the future competitive edge of world automobile industry will come from the effective quality management of products in global contexts