When Japanese car sales plunged in the turbulence after the second world war, Toyota Motor turned to executives outside its founding family to safeguard the 10-year-old company..
Almost 60 years later, Toyota is hoping the reverse strategy will work in another crisis, appointing Akio Toyoda to be its first founding-family chief executive since the mid-1990s.
It is a job that will test skills both inherited and learned. Toyota's global sales fell 4 per cent last year, driven down by a 15 per cent plunge in the US and declines in Japan and western Europe. It expects to report its first operating loss in decades for the financial year ending in March and has slashed production, jobs and investment in response.
Local media have labelled Mr Toyoda's appointment taisei hokan, after a 19th century edict that restored Japan's emperors to power after centuries of military rule. The usage is slightly mordant: many have asked why a family that controls just 2 per cent of Toyota's shares should be able to install its scion as chief executive.
“A weakness of Japanese companies is they cannot disconnect from the influence of the founding family,” one senior industrialist said.
Yet Mr Toyoda appears aware of the need to prove himself. At a news conference on the 20 Jan he showed off his grasp of car-market statistics and industry lore, weaving explanations of vehicle replacement rates in the US and the history of the Ford Model T into an exaltation of Toyota's long-term growth potential.
“I was born with the last name Toyota so I didn't have a choice [of career],” he said. “But I don't think of myself as just a banner for the company.”
His grooming has been thorough. Fluent in English, he joined Toyota in 1984 after earning an MBA at Babson College in Massachusetts. His first assignment was to draw up production schedules at one of Toyota's Japanese factories – a vital introduction to the company's just-in-time manufacturing system.
More senior jobs have included vice-president of Nummi, Toyota's California manufacturing joint venture with General Motors, and head of Toyota's increasingly important China business.
He is said to have lobbied Chinese leaders to allow the sale of Toyota's initial local partner, Tianjin Automotive Xiali, to the larger First Automotive Works, a deal that went ahead in 2002 and is credited with accelerating Toyota's sales growth.
参考译文：
当日本的汽车销售额在二战后的动荡岁月骤降之时，丰田汽车(Toyota Motor)求助于创始人家族以外的管理人员，以守护这家拥有10年历史的企业。
近60年过去了，丰田汽车希望以相反的策略应对另一场危机——任命丰田章男(Akio Toyoda)为首席执行官，这是自上世纪90年代中期以来首位来自创始人家族的首席执行官。
这项工作对接任者先天继承与后天习得的能力均有所考验。去年，受美国销售额骤降15%、及日本和西欧销售额下滑所累，丰田全球销售额下降4%。预计在截至今年3月的这个财年，丰田将公布数十年来首个营业亏损。作为对此的回应措施，该公司已大幅削减产出、工作岗位和投资。
当地媒体沿用19世纪的一道官方命令，把对丰田章男的任命称为“大政奉还”(taisei hokan)——在经历数个世纪的幕府统治后，日本天皇收回政权。这种叫法有一点讽刺意味：许多人质疑，为何一个仅掌控丰田2%股权的家族，可以将它的子孙安置在首席执行官的位置上。
一名资深企业家表示：“日本企业的弱点在于，它们无法摆脱创始人家族的影响。”
不过，丰田章男似乎意识到了他必须证明自己。在1月20日召开的新闻发布会上，他炫耀了一下自己对汽车市场数据和行业知识的掌握，在颂扬丰田长期增长潜力时，穿插说明了美国车辆更新率以及福特T型车(Ford Model T)的历史。
他表示；“我生来就姓丰田，所以我无法选择（职业）。但我不认为自己仅仅是公司的一个标志。”
他受到过全面的训练。从马萨诸塞州巴布森学院(Babson College)获得MBA学位后，英语流利的他于1984年加入丰田。他的第一项工作就是为丰田的一家日本工厂拟定生产计划——这是该公司引入准时生产制(just-in-time)的至关重要的一步。
丰田章男担任过的其它高级职位还包括丰田位于美国加州、与通用汽车(General Motors)合资的新联合汽车制造公司(Nummi)的副总裁，以及对丰田来说日益重要的、中国业务的主管。
据称，丰田章男曾游说中国领导人，允许丰田在当地的首位合作伙伴天津夏利(Tianjin Automotive Xiali)出售给规模更大的一汽集团(First Automotive Works)。该交易在2002年取得了进展，对丰田销售额的增长起到了促进作用。
（转载）
