285 Japan Inc

<p class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US" xml:lang="EN-US">“What anchors their behavior is the salaryman’s desire to protect himself – no one wants to put their position at risk by telling the truth”.  This little gem of an insight was made by a retired nuclear engineer who worked for Toshiba.  He was referring to the various scandals that had taken place there and explaining why illegal decisions made by senior management like cooking the books went unchecked internally.</span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US" xml:lang="EN-US">Corporate Japan in some ways, could be a modern model for George Orwell’s dystopian novel “1984”.  Big Brother is the leadership group who define that truths are lies and lies are truths.  They determine that anyone against the system must be eliminated, because 100% loyalty is the minimum.  There are facts and then there are “alternative facts”.  The bosses do the thinking around here and your job is to carry out their genius ideas.</span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US" xml:lang="EN-US">This is not surprising, because kids are inculcated into accepting authority, doing not questioning, following authority figures, even if they are only one year older.  Sempai (seniors) sensei (teachers) are respected as part of Japan’s Confucian construct.  Group responsibility lessens the burden and gives air cover to individuals. They have learnt this is essential if you want to avoid the stain of failure on your record.  When everyone is responsible, no one is responsible.</span><span lang= "EN-US" xml:lang="EN-US"> </span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US" xml:lang="EN-US">Errors are kept track of and come into play later in your career when the bosses consider who gets the promotion to move up and who goes sideways.  That is one of the reasons HR is so powerful in Japanese companies – they decide the transfers to new roles and locations and they have the dirt file on everyone as they come up through the ranks.  This system guarantees little risk taking or attempts to p