Toyota uses Notion to drive more efficient workflows with collaboration that comes standard
Toyota’s Frontier Research Center is at the forefront of the future for the largest brand in one of the world’s largest industries. Their team is responsible for not only conducting a wide range of research but also sharing findings with the world. Since switching to Notion to consolidate and centrally manage all of this work, they're more efficient and productive than ever before.
Streamlined workflows in Notion reduce approval timelines by 3x
For the researchers at Toyota, sharing findings with the public is just as important as conducting the research itself. To do this, the research center promotes their work on social media for the world to engage with. But doing so requires a rigorous approval process to ensure accuracy and maintain the integrity of the Toyota brand. Before switching to Notion, this process was a tedious back-and-forth exchange of messages between various teams that was painfully inefficient.
With Notion, every post gets drafted and sent for approval in an easy-to-follow workflow that ends with a single click of the “approve” button that reduced approval timelines by 3x. Instead of the back and forth messages, the team can quickly check statuses and receive automated notifications of changes and updates.
Instant access to a single source of truth boosted efficiency and collaboration
In addition to workflows, Toyota also keeps more dynamic information like research schedules and budgets in Notion. What used to be captured in multiple versions of a spreadsheet with a single owner is now in a shared Notion database. Now, instead of struggling to figure out which spreadsheet is reliable and up-to-date, everyone at Toyota can turn to the same Notion database as their single source of truth.
Plus, with automations and notifications, the right people get updates when a status property has been changed. And seeing that same database in a timeline view gives everyone a cohesive overview of what’s going on across the organization and when.
Consolidate information so you don’t need to look anywhere else
The group conducting R&D on humanoid robots struggled to efficiently use their meeting minutes and background information because they were stored in different places.
By using Notion, they could centrally manage all this information in a single database, including morning meeting minutes, tasks, and research knowledge. This made daily morning meetings more efficient, as members could consolidate information on the meeting minutes page. Progress management also became easier by categorizing tasks as issues, defects, bugs, and other useful titles. Research knowledge can now be stored in the database with one click using Web Clipper. Consolidating all this information in Notion means group members don't need to look anywhere else.
Notion’s customizations and versatility now fuels a culture of documentation
What many at Toyota have enjoyed most about Notion is the ability to express any type of information with different types of standardized content blocks. Whether it’s text, an image, or a table, customizing pages allows Notion to be used for a wide variety of use cases at the company. This not only cuts the time it takes to create a doc in half but also makes the work feel more enjoyable.
Making the work easier and more enjoyable ultimately results in a more robust culture of documentation at the company that benefits everyone and drives their research forward faster than ever before.