This helped deliver the highest business value capabilities early, and at lower cost of delivery. By fixing the capacity and output cadence each factory teams were naturally forced to prioritize to deliver what matters most for when it is needed, inspired by just-in-time principle. We designed each digital factory with a fixed capacity that delivers software changes on a fixed cadence of every two weeks. We applied Toyota’s world class car manufacturing and engineering practices to software engineering. Second, we adopted the mindset of building a software product just like we build cars. Product Digital Factories, on the other hand, have a dedicated team, or “factory,” accountable for continuously improving a product capability. We knew that the traditional time-bound project model was inefficient, with administrative overheads. One key to driving change in behaviors was shifting our operating model from projects to digital product factories.

Our early focus on behaviors and habits first was the real game changer. Yes, we need to transform the technology to transform our business, but before that, we focused on transforming our behaviors to move more quickly with new digital business practices. The key to our moving so quickly came from turning the transformation logic upside down.

Toyota financial services