What We Do
Well-functioning communities weave people’s lives into a cohesive, flexible, and supportive fabric. When that fabric frays, people can feel disconnected, lonely, or fearful.
The Harmonious Communities Department is reimagining what it means to create happiness for all. Our work extends the legacy of the Toyota Production System, which transformed how the world builds things, into a new frontier: how we build human thriving.
We conduct research at the intersection of behavioral science, human–computer interaction, and artificial intelligence to develop new ways of understanding and supporting well-being at work. By combining data-driven methods with human insight, we aim to make every moment at work contribute to a fulfilled life, first for Toyota’s team members, and ultimately for communities everywhere.
Our team takes an interdisciplinary approach to one of humanity’s oldest questions: how can we live well together while honoring our differences?
Our solutions aim to cultivate harmony at every scale, from small interactions between team members to the global communities connected through Toyota.
Our customers are everyone, everywhere—because well-being is a shared endeavor, shaped by how we show up for one another.
The Challenges
People everywhere are asking new questions about the role of work in their lives: How can work be not just a means of survival, but a source of meaning, connection, and growth?
In factories and offices alike, technology now performs tasks once reserved for human expertise. As a result, the question facing our generation is not simply how to stay productive. It’s how to stay purposeful. The same technological change that enables unprecedented efficiency also risks eroding the meaning that gives work its human value. Our mission is to bridge that gap: to design a future where progress and purpose advance together.
To achieve this, we focus on three research challenges:
- Understanding the drivers of human thriving across diverse contexts of work and life.
- Building intelligent systems that sense well-being challenges and simulate potential solutions.
- Designing technologies that directly enhance well-being and close gaps in how people experience their work.
Our challenge is as much philosophical as it is technical: to prove that happiness can be designed, measured, and continuously improved, just as quality once was.