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Toyota Ethical Audit

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Toyota Ethical Audit
1.0 INTRODUCTION
Toyota Motor Corporation, commonly known as Toyota, is a global corporation headquartered in Japan. At its climax, Toyota employed approximately 320,000 people worldwide. It is the world 's largest automobile maker by sales. The company was founded by Kiichiro Toyoda in 1937 as a spinoff from his father 's company Toyota Industries to create automobiles. Toyota also owns and operates Lexus and Scion brands and has a majority shareholding stake in Daihatsu and Hino Motors, and minority shareholdings in Fuji Heavy Industries, Isuzu Motors, Yamaha Motors, and Mitsubishi Aircraft Corporation. The company includes 522 subsidiaries. In 2009-2010, the company was heavily in debt and had to request a loan of more than $3 billion from a bank backed by the Japanese government. Its net income was 153 billion yen ($1.68bn; £1.06bn) after a loss of 164 billion yen a year earlier. Toyota confirmed its estimate that it would lose about $2bn (£1.23bn) in costs and lost sales from its worldwide recall of potentially faulty vehicles.
The objectives of writing this ethical audit report on Toyota are: I. To identify the ethical dilemmas facing by the company. II. To discuss the evaluation of the relative importance of the dilemmas and how Toyota is currently dealing them. III. Also to explain Toyota ethical best practices and values. IV. And lastly, to give recommendations that will enable Toyota to give appropriate answers to its critics.

2.0 ETHICAL DILEMMAS FACING TOYOTA
An ethical dilemma is a situation where in moral precepts or ethical obligations conflict in such a way that any possible resolution to the dilemma is morally intolerable. In other words, an ethical dilemma is any situation in which guiding moral principles cannot determine which course of action is right or wrong. Below are some of the ethical dilemmas Toyota is facing.
2.1 safety Issues
According to Plantes (2010), “Toyota is manufacturing unsafely cars that lead to


References: 24-7 Pressrelease. (2010). Braking Problem Prompts another Toyota Recall. [Online]. Available: http://www.24-7pressrelease.com/press-release-rss/braking-problem-prompts-another-toyota-recall-141083.php (Accessed 10 December 2010). BBC News, (2010). US to probe Toyota Prius brake problems. [Online]. Available: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/8497471.stm (Accessed 5 December 2010). Bruner, K. Epperson, L & McNany, M. (2008). Toyota Motor Corporation. [Online]. Available: http://www.plu.edu/~brunerkm/Final%20report-toyota.pdf (Accessed 13 December 2010). Business Development Partners. (2006). The Toyota Way. [Online]. Available: http://www.b-d-p.com/images/uploaded/TheToyotaWay20061117b.pdf (Accessed 12 December 2010). Crane, A & Matten, D. ( 2007). What is the nature of corporate social responsibilities? Business Ethics. 2nd Ed. Oxford. New York. Ejaz, R. (N.D). Learn how to conduct business ethically. [Online]. Available: http://www.scribd.com/doc/31604081/Ethical-Issues-on-Toyota (Accessed 27 November 2010). Fackler, M. (2007). Does 'The Toyota Way ' Really Work Outside Japan? [Online]. Available: http://www.nichegeek.com/does_toyota_wayreally_work_outside_japan (Accessed 12 December 2010). Fernando, V. (2010). Blame Toyota 's Disaster On Japanese Corporate Culture. [Online]. Available: http://www.businessinsider.com/blame-toyotas-disaster-on-japanese-corporate-culture-2010-2 (Accessed 10 December 2010). Gu, R. (2010). Toyota 's acceleration problem: Thousands of bad drivers? [Online]. Available: http://theweek.com/article/index/204945/toyotas-acceleration-problem-thousands-of-bad-drivers (Accessed 7 December 2010). Hinton, M. (2010). More trouble for Toyota, professor cites cultural differences. [Online]. Available: http://wdbo.com/localnews/2010/02/more-trouble-for-toyota-profes.html (Accessed 11 December 2010) Hursthouse, R Liker, J & Hoseus, M. (2008). DNA of Toyota lies in its culture. Toyota culture: the heart and soul of the Toyota way. McGraw Hills, United States of America. Los Angeles Times (2010). Toyota Chief Apologizes as Quality Crisis Escalates. [Online]. Available: http://www.globalethics.org/newsline/2010/02/08/toyota-apologizes/ (Accessed 25 November 2010). Plantes, K. (2010). Toyota’s once unbeatable business model now anything but. [Online]. Available: http://wistechnology.com/articles/7073/ (Accessed 10 December 2010) Toyota Material Handling Europe Weiss, J. (2009). Employee rights in the workplace. Business Ethics: A stakeholder & Issues Management Approach. 5th Ed. South- Western Cengage Learning. United State of America Wikipedia Wikipedia. (2010). Deontological ethics. [Online]. Available: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deontological_ethics (Accessed 13th December 2010). Wittjen, S. (N.d.). Virtue Ethics. [Online] .Available: http://apps.tpta.org/courses/Ethics03/virtue_ethics.htm (Accessed 17 December 2010)
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