Japanese Odyssey Continues

Every visit to Japan you come back more humbled with the experiences you encounter in Japan about how inward focussed and complex the business environment is . The very traditional and orthodox organizations are trying to breakaway from being typecast in that mould at-least at the Leadership levels. But will the rest of the fabric support a leader with unconventional thinking is highly questionable.

Chances are that there is surely a ray of hope in organizations where substantial part of the revenues are derived from outside the domestic japanese market. Organizations such as Nissan , Sony  and Toyota are  prime examples of movement in the direction of becoming more Global in there mindset. My earlier post on the contradictions at Toyota delineates a similar point. 

The Nuances and subtleties while conducting business are so many,that at times  it is just impossible to judge and  conclude with any patterns. Very often Non japanese teams get exasperated with the japanese using   the word "problem" ( "mondai" in Japanese)at every step or at every discussion point.

Actually the nuance of the word "problem" is much stronger in English then the word "mondai" which they actually mean . Mondai just means it needs to be looked into .....

"Hai" or "Hai Wakarimashita" are words you can not get of japan with out hearing to a couple of hundred times. " Yes or Yes i Understand" signifies comprehension or it just means what has been communicated by you has been received but in no way can be interpreted as the idea or suggestion you have given is understood and accepted. 

While conducting discussions and at times in formal gatherings it is very difficult to judge who the real leader or decision maker is . The ceremonial structure or the people with bigger titles at times might have very little to do with the decision making process.  A few titles terminologies which i got to understand are "bucho" means a division manager and "Kacho" the lowest level is a section manager . Most cases the high ranking official is a director who is "toroshimariyuko", who could also be a Divisional General Manager "honbucho". Most cases the ceremonial structure could be very different from the actual power structure.

It will also be very difficult to identify the real Leader in japanese team and it is important to be able to do this because even though japanese make decisions on a group and consensus basis , the nominal leader could be some what of a "maverick" and therefore delay the progress or depending on how favorable he is to you can speeden the progress. 

Another factor to take into consideration is that leadership can swing from one member to another depending on the situation and issue at hand. At times the Leader can be very silent and at other times he might do most of the talking.

Welcome to the land of  Ambiguity !  "Japan" 

Japan is an Exonym for "Nippon or Nihon"  which means the "Land of the Rising Sun"

The Naniwabushi Strategy

Naniwabushi would be the most typical Japanese way of resolving or avoiding disputes . In business it will go as follows , suppose you  wish to negotiate revised payment terms for your contract due to the real sad business climate . Then you would approach your Lender or Customer by giving a "Kikkake"

Kikkake is setting the base , give a background ,how good a partner you have been through the thick and thin talk about all the good points of the relationship both of you have enjoyed etc etc.

Once the Stage is set move towards "Seme" talk about the disastrous effects the recession is doing on your business , how u have been cutting costs , how you are making your ends meet etc . But despite all the cost control , you will be able to survive only if some more leniency is given to your payment terms etc .

In the "Urei"  , you will need to explain what will happen if the request is not granted ... you and your family will be on the streets .. make it as melodramatic as possible ... Pleading is ok 

Naniwabushi is artful , premeditated , calculated and in Japan it will work . The  more tragic and melodramatic , it is easier for Japanese listeners to forget contracts or commitments . People who do not show compassion in such circumstances will be condemned as being cold hearted or mercenary .

"Nemawashi" : This is a practice of preliminary and informal sounding out of people's ideas or course of action before a formal proposal is drawn up .  Nemawashi is more akin to binding the roots before re-planting the tree. If people have strong objections to a proposal , nemawashi enables this to be discovered in advance and there by making the acceptance of the formal proposal more certain.

Contradictions @ Toyota's - The Japanese Odyssey

Came across this interesting article in HBR about Toyota's interesting outlook to how they look at both "Soft innovation" and "Hard Innovation" when it comes to the organization DNA . It goes without a doubt that the organization has mastered both and it seeps down to grass root levels.

"Soft" is all about the organization management style and how it breeds effectiveness at all levels despite being a huge and gives a feeling of huge mammoth which is going to come down in troubled times.

The company views employees as knowledge workers and not just a pair of hands and hence at all levels they accumulate immense amount of "Chie" -the wisdom of experience. Six major contradictory tendencies were noticed in a research by the authors of this article , which influence this organization culture.

1. Toyota moves slowly yet it take big leaps 
2. Toyota grows steadily , yet it is a paranoid company 
3. Toyota  operations are efficient , but it uses employee's time in seemingly wasteful ways
4. Toyota is frugal but it splurges on key areas 
5. Toyota insists on internal communications to be simple , yet it builds complex networks
6. Toyota has a strict hierarchy, but it gives freedom to push back 

While in most organizations Goals are very clearly thought out and debated and set with an intent to achieve it with as much precision as possible , In Toyota the contradiction is the Goal is set more with an intent of direction and again most times it is fairly "impossible" to achieve . This trait could be pushing most managers to stretch as much as possible and prevents rigidity from creeping in.

Also another important aspect being when you are doing business beyond Japan the home country the culture which it  has imbibed is to ensure that in each country it customizes vehicles to the extent it is required in that country . It is not about tinkering with one type fits all. In-fact this aspect led to the organization replacing " Made in Japan" label with "Made by Toyota".

Experimentation : The concept of setting near impossible goals is well mitigated with the culture of experimentation. That is break down the major Goal into smaller packets of manageable challenges and then experiment using strict routines . It has refined the Plan Do Check Act (PDCA) model into Eight stepped Toyota business process . Many a times it helps the employees to break the status Quo; 

• Clarify the problem
  
• break down the problem
  
• Set a Target
  
• Analyze the root cause 
  
• develop the counter measures 
  
• see counter measures through 
  
• monitor both results and processes
  
• Standardize the successful process
  

Similarly the A-3 report is a standard in Toyota and forces all to capture the most essential information needed to solve a problem and it is proliferated across the organization.

As Toyota expands rapidly new products new markets  , challenges any organization is bound to come across is how do the ethos percolate across the organization down to root levels and across all levels . Again the when it comes to Toyota and the research done by the authors of this article clearly found patterns about the organization behavior which could be articulated by usage of the following terminologies :

Genchi Genbutsu , which essentially means "Have you seen it yourself?" Toyota encourages each of its senior executives to go down to the factory line, the dealerships etc and experience the same.

A few others like the conventional aspects like "Teamwork" , Positive mindset and Customer focus are also practiced with great deal of sincerity across the organization. 

However, a few aspects which need to be admired and other organizations need to try and emulate are the ones related to how you treat under performers . The focus which is there on re-skilling people and literally having a statement etched that Toyota does not believe in Job cuts even in a poorly performing market situation.

During Evaluation ,Toyota gives lot more emphasis to process performance and learning over results. The company looks at how the person has achieved the goals rather then the goal itself.  A few of the unique criteria it adopts which are very fuzzy and subjective  :

• Jinbo : How you command respect amongst your peers , juniors and seniors. Very difficult to judge this unless you have worked very deeply with the person
  
• nebari tsuyosa : Adhesives strength , how resolute or persistent are you ?
  

Despite being a very large and mammoth Enterprise , it still functions like a small town company , there are many other subtle aspects which help in achieving the same. All about the emphasis given Human networks or what Toyota describes as the Nerve System.

Openness is manifested even in the way offices are designed which have no partitions (obeya ) and Mieruka ( Visualization ). The later means having posters on the wall for all of them to see . Let us Yokoten  means open side ways ! ... share among your peers as well ....

Give freedom to to voice contrary views : Confronting your boss is acceptable , bringing bad news to boss is encouraged and ignoring the boss is often excused.

My Japanese Odyssey

The art of Negotiation is vastly different in a japanese perspective to what we consider the conventional perspective or what we are normally used to . Very often the impression/mindset we have is being articulative , forceful communicator , who wins the argument with Logic as the ideal way of going about the art of Negotiation . In Japan this might not work in most cases, a person with the above skills might be mostly regarded as rude , aggressive and at times even vulgar. 

Another aspect being in general you will not come across Japanese as self centered or being irrational , if you do come across then it is more of an exception. The trait of showing economic value to a buyer and being passionate about the company or its product in a non Japanese environment is a huge positive . But in Japan context unless it is tempered with a liberal dose of being sympathetic to the personal issues / organization will not yield the best results for you.  The truth is that the Japanese do not like negotiation . The instinct is for agreements worked back stage with give and take , harmony and long term interest. But it is still commonly accepted that if two parties trust each other , money and other details need not be discussed. Thus to this date in most industries in japan neither contracts nor invoices nor product catalogues are used . To read the fine print of the contract is sacrilege and to do so would imply a lack of trust. 

The fact that one can also meet Japanese businessmen who are manifestly self centered and cold "economic animals" is in my view, only to encounter exceptions to a still valid generalization. 

The odyssey continues......