Fear of shame, failure, standing out, being shown up, showing someone up, or making a mistake is considered a factor in high risk aversion. Fear of making clients ‘look bad by knowing more than them’ increases the intensity of the client relationship noted above (and the intensity of the client relationship reinforces the fear). To deal with this fear, change is avoided, and consensus through discussion is sought.
****************************************************
This post is part of a series of excerpts from interviews with foreign executives in Japan, focusing on creativity. Excerpts have been edited for confidentiality.
We’d love to hear your thoughts and experiences in relation to this topic. Please feel free to comment directly on this site or get in touch at chris@a-small-lab.com (Chris Berthelsen)
All content on this IDEAS and DISCUSSION blog is provided by a-small-lab under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 Unported License: You can SHARE this content as long as you CITE this work, and TELL US about your work (and send us a copy or link!). See Creative Commons for more detail
“The difficulty with this is that, if you really want to manage change, you have manager who has been rewarded his whole career on creating harmony and we know that it takes some positive dissonance to create any change. You have to push people out of their comfort zone to create change of any kind, and creativity and innovation are kinds of change. So it would be very difficult for a Japanese manager to reverse his whole set of behavioural characteristics and suddenly become a change agent. You might be able to take that same manager and drop him into another corporate culture where he doesn’t have all this history and maybe he would have the personal capabilities to do it, but in his own organization it’s very difficult. So Japanese managers have to rely on some external motivations to effect change; in a sense they have to blame other people for having to force their people to do these things.”
****************************************************
This post is part of a series of excerpts from interviews with foreign executives in Japan, focusing on creativity. Excerpts have been edited for confidentiality.
We’d love to hear your thoughts and experiences in relation to this topic. Please feel free to comment directly on this site or get in touch at chris@a-small-lab.com (Chris Berthelsen)
All content on this IDEAS and DISCUSSION blog is provided by a-small-lab under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 Unported License: You can SHARE this content as long as you CITE this work, and TELL US about your work (and send us a copy or link!). See Creative Commons for more detail
“The first characteristic is probably the ability to receive advice – the ability to identify allies and build a team of people who are able to influence the organization. It is also important to be able identify who the opinion leaders are and who the change agents might be, and to work with them effectively.
I also think that the ability to create positive dissonance but still maintain harmony is important. In a way that has to do with generating goodwill, so it’s a personal characteristic - being warm and human and at the same time creating understanding of the need for change. I guess a lot of that comes down to good communication skills. But before communication comes listening, so the ability to listen well, and listen well across cultures is important. I think you can learn that in other countries, not just in Japan. I’ve worked with CEOs who have never been to Japan before, but who have a lot of global experience. The successful ones have the abilities I just mentioned.”
“The leadership characteristics are not so different from what you would require for success as a leader in any other culture, but there is probably a heavier emphasis on the ability to trust and rely on others, and to listen intuitively.”
****************************************************
This post is part of a series of excerpts from interviews with foreign executives in Japan, focusing on creativity. Excerpts have been edited for confidentiality.
We’d love to hear your thoughts and experiences in relation to this topic. Please feel free to comment directly on this site or get in touch at chris@a-small-lab.com (Chris Berthelsen)
All content on this IDEAS and DISCUSSION blog is provided by a-small-lab under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 Unported License: You can SHARE this content as long as you CITE this work, and TELL US about your work (and send us a copy or link!). See Creative Commons for more detail
“It takes a long time to build trust and relationships. You can’t just walk in and do it overnight. You can’t just overlay everything from the top down. The most successful programmes that I have run have been working through other functional heads and line managers where you actually have to use ‘in betweens’ – where you can bring the ideas and they push and pull and shape it till it makes sense to them. Then they can do really great things, they can add the polish and the detail and that’s where they really excel. It’s hard to find Japanese managers that will stand up in a meeting and present a new idea that might not be immediately accepted.”
****************************************************
This post is part of a series of excerpts from interviews with foreign executives in Japan, focusing on creativity. Excerpts have been edited for confidentiality.
We’d love to hear your thoughts and experiences in relation to this topic. Please feel free to comment directly on this site or get in touch at chris@a-small-lab.com (Chris Berthelsen)
All content on this IDEAS and DISCUSSION blog is provided by a-small-lab under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 Unported License: You can SHARE this content as long as you CITE this work, and TELL US about your work (and send us a copy or link!). See Creative Commons for more detail
“You have to be able to influence the Japanese. Unfortunately it’s also a culture where most foreigners come in and out, and your average Japanese staff who still is life-time employment oriented will just survive the current foreigner. Working as a long-term employee side-by-side then, you are forced in a sense to reign back your ‘blue-sky tendencies” and so in a way I think it does put a damper on your creativity and people that are here a long time who aren’t the ‘template bringers’ can really lose their edge.”
****************************************************
This post is part of a series of excerpts from interviews with foreign executives in Japan, focusing on creativity. Excerpts have been edited for confidentiality.
We’d love to hear your thoughts and experiences in relation to this topic. Please feel free to comment directly on this site or get in touch at chris@a-small-lab.com (Chris Berthelsen)
All content on this IDEAS and DISCUSSION blog is provided by a-small-lab under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 Unported License: You can SHARE this content as long as you CITE this work, and TELL US about your work (and send us a copy or link!). See Creative Commons for more detail
I think that people are more willing to take a risk or gamble in other countries than they are here. I think that it is harder to earn trust here. It takes longer. Whatever you have, whatever experience you have in the West doesn’t really matter, it doesn’t translate.
****************************************************
This post is part of a series of excerpts from interviews with foreign executives in Japan, focusing on creativity. Excerpts have been edited for confidentiality.
We’d love to hear your thoughts and experiences in relation to this topic. Please feel free to comment directly on this site or get in touch at chris@a-small-lab.com (Chris Berthelsen)
All content on this IDEAS and DISCUSSION blog is provided by a-small-lab under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 Unported License: You can SHARE this content as long as you CITE this work, and TELL US about your work (and send us a copy or link!). See Creative Commons for more detail
When we were starting out we didn’t get one sale. Not one. We had all the buyers come and have a look at our collection but nobody bought anything. They were all waiting to see whether we would be around in six-months. Then, six-months later we had our sales exhibition and almost no one came. We were thinking that we would need to re-work the company because we were obviously not doing things right. Then the next day one buyer came and bought three of our brands. Then a major department store chain came in did a small buy. At that point we promised that we would really work it in the press and make sure that the pieces that they bought would sell out. We did what we promised and they came back and then bought up big……so there definitely is value in building up trust. After four years we still have to earn it, and we work really hard, but we have had an incredible year this year especially considering it’s a recession.
****************************************************
This post is part of a series of excerpts from interviews with foreign executives in Japan, focusing on creativity. Excerpts have been edited for confidentiality.
We’d love to hear your thoughts and experiences in relation to this topic. Please feel free to comment directly on this site or get in touch at chris@a-small-lab.com (Chris Berthelsen)
All content on this IDEAS and DISCUSSION blog is provided by a-small-lab under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 Unported License: You can SHARE this content as long as you CITE this work, and TELL US about your work (and send us a copy or link!). See Creative Commons for more detail
Maybe I was arrogant in thinking that I could come in and get a top spot straight away even though my work and my background should be enough that I would be able to do that if I was in another country (like Singapore). But here, I guess you have to pay your dues. (C: So at least for foreigners it’s not a talent or even experience based system?) Yeah, it’s a respect thing and you have to show that you are in for the long haul.
****************************************************
This post is part of a series of excerpts from interviews with foreign executives in Japan, focusing on creativity. Excerpts have been edited for confidentiality.
We’d love to hear your thoughts and experiences in relation to this topic. Please feel free to comment directly on this site or get in touch at chris@a-small-lab.com (Chris Berthelsen)
All content on this IDEAS and DISCUSSION blog is provided by a-small-lab under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 Unported License: You can SHARE this content as long as you CITE this work, and TELL US about your work (and send us a copy or link!). See Creative Commons for more detail
I do think that there are certain tests that you have to pass with Japanese people. At first they think that you are just some foreigner who is coming over for three months and they don’t want to invest time in you and take the time to know you. But if you have been around for three years or more then you have passed that test of time I think. It’s definitely a trust issue.
****************************************************
This post is part of a series of excerpts from interviews with foreign executives in Japan, focusing on creativity. Excerpts have been edited for confidentiality.
We’d love to hear your thoughts and experiences in relation to this topic. Please feel free to comment directly on this site or get in touch at chris@a-small-lab.com (Chris Berthelsen)
All content on this IDEAS and DISCUSSION blog is provided by a-small-lab under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 Unported License: You can SHARE this content as long as you CITE this work, and TELL US about your work (and send us a copy or link!). See Creative Commons for more detail
C: You were saying earlier that you have to be respectful when you are trying to convey something to somebody. Is that also something that is particularly true for Japan or is it more of a feature of working on an international level?
It’s definitely something that is specific to Japan. I think that if you go over to New York and you talk to a designer over there you will find that people are incredibly rude and disrespectful to everybody. Sydney is the same way. Paris is icy. You just can’t be like that with Japanese people.
When Japanese people experience the way people act in those countries they are incredibly offended and they can’t convey that because they can’t speak English. We went to a trade show in Australia about four years ago and there were some Japanese stores and Japanese buyers who got kicked out of their seats so that some girl the seating guy had met the night before could sit in the front row. They were incredibly offended but nobody understood that and nobody cared. The show lost a lot of business because of it – even we stopped going because of the way that foreigners can treat you. So, from the outside coming into this country you really have to play the game right otherwise you won’t be able to do business, people will shut you out.
****************************************************
This post is part of a series of excerpts from interviews with foreign executives in Japan, focusing on creativity. Excerpts have been edited for confidentiality.
We’d love to hear your thoughts and experiences in relation to this topic. Please feel free to comment directly on this site or get in touch at chris@a-small-lab.com (Chris Berthelsen)
All content on this IDEAS and DISCUSSION blog is provided by a-small-lab under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 Unported License: You can SHARE this content as long as you CITE this work, and TELL US about your work (and send us a copy or link!). See Creative Commons for more detail
