Managing for Creativity in Japan Talking with Foreign Executives in Japan
Freedom and Autonomy
On Being a Foreign Employer
“….First of all, it’s a risk to work for foreigners. Two, it’s not a safe, established Japanese company…”
Broad Minded Employees
“…They haven’t worked underneath other Japanese companies in our industry so they don’t have this kind of robotic (or moronic) way of working instilled in them…”
Don’t Teach, Learn
“…Because they don’t have a long-term commitment to be here they need to get results quick….”
A Green Plant in the Desert
“…If you are a green plant in the middle of the desert you are going to die…”
The Weirdo
“..You can’t have him as one of the battery hens, how can you have creativity in that scenario? It’s impossible….”
The Whole Train Set
“When you are a country manager overseas, you can short-cut a lot of that. If you want to do something that isn’t directly touching the customer, that doesn’t need head office funds, then you don’t really have to have the same degrees of people involved in the decision or have the same formal gateposts. Something [...]
Stuck in the Office
“When people are working in an office in this country they are probably about a third as productive as workers in a Western country, I think. That is a number I have run by a few people and there seems to be a consensus about this. People take three times as long to do things [...]
Risk Averse Clients
“Clients in Japan don’t generally ask for advice from their suppliers, they generally tell their suppliers what to do and tend to be very prescriptive. They tend to go into great detail about how they want something to be done. The client generally wants to have a very detailed input into everything. I think my [...]
