After the big week of Congressional testimony, Toyota has announced it will create two new executive positions in the U.S. — both focusing on quality. The intent is to make the giant maker more responsive when potential country issues crop up.

One of the positions will be a chief country executive who works full-time on recalls and calibre concerns. The other, higher-ranking position, a U.S. calibre chief, will work with Toyota North American President Yoshimi Inaba and sit on the new Special Committee for Global Quality led by company CEO Akio Toyoda.

"Virtually all decisions relating to recalls and country matters are decided in Japan," Jim Wiseman, Toyota spokesman, told the Detroit News. "This is an effort to elevate key North American executives in major positions of responsibility and dominance in that process."

Although these moves are ostensibly borne out of the recall mess, it has widely been expected that Toyoda would

review the company's leadership structure to give major regions like the U.S. more decision-making power, specifically over their product portfolios — rather than continuing the practice of having all dominance concentrated in Japan.

Detroit News