Characteristics of Thailand's automotive industry managers based on the SYMLOG model

The automotive industry in Thailand has been identified as one of the most important strategic areas of industrial development in the country. This situation has intensified in the recent months due to significant reduction in government's protectionist policies, which has exposed inefficient and low quality producers to extreme competitive pressures.;It is well understood that the technology and the capital resources available and used in the global automotive industry in Thailand will not be very different than that are available anywhere else. The critical factor in the competitiveness of Thailand's auto industry will be the performance of the human element in the overall auto industry system. In an attempt to understand the behavior patterns of the Thai auto industry a study was conducted to develop the value images of the managers as the key personnel involved in producing globally competitive products. The SYMLOG questionnaire approach was used to determine the Current state value images (CUR) and the Future state value images (FUT) of these managers. Their value images representing the Reward system (REW) and the value images of the Most Effective performance (EFF) were also determined using the SYMLOG methodology.;The results show that the Current state is definitely away from the desired future and most effective performance value images; and the Reward value image, even though it is positioned in the right direction, remains under developed as it occupies a position between the current state and the future and the desired most effective states.;Thus the research findings suggest that Thai auto industry among other things, must implement appropriate training programs to shift the value images of its managerial work force to strengthen the effectiveness of the Reward value images (REW) so that it is more conducive to moving the Current state (CUR) towards a union with the desired Future (FUT) and Most Effective (EFF) states.