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While exchange of favors and mutual aid are common to all cultures, there are some differences in the way Japanese and Americans view these things. Read More

If the U.S. wants to choose a female Ambassador to Japan who will serve as a role model to inspire Japanese women to pursue careers and stick with them, a better choice might be a woman who has put in her time and worked her way up the ladder at the State Department. Read More

"A messy desk is the sign of a creative mind" This shows a typical American attitude that "neatness" is something divorced from "getting things done" -- quite opposite from the Japanese feeling that it's difficult to work productively in a messy space. Read More

In Japan, women do not have the same role in the workplace as women in the United States…As Japanese companies have increased their M&A activity in the U.S. recently, I have been hearing these kinds of concerns from American women frequently… Read More

There was no business strategy reason, or other explanation…Just doing it because all our competitors were, and we didn't want to be the only one not doing it… I'm not sure who was more flabbergasted…

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Once one has become familiar with reading and writing A3 reports, they can certainly increase efficiency…any employee can pick up a report from anywhere else in the company and immediately understand the key points it is trying to convey. Read More

Japanese tend to not want praise for things that they think are not perfect and still need work…Given this negative meaning of compliments, it makes sense that Japanese might feel uncomfortable getting them.

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I don’t happen to have children, but I imagine that if I did I wouldn’t need a recorded voice to tell me that I needed to hold their hands on an escalator. And if I were a senior citizen, I would want to make my own choice about whether I thought I needed to have my hand held.

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Western communication style relies heavily on words. In contrast, Japanese communication relies less on verbal manipulation, and more heavily on non-verbals. Japanese are able to rely more on non-verbals for their communication, due to what scholars refer to as a high degree of shared context… Read More

Recently there are more examples of Japanese firms that are creating global databases of all their employees, not just the ones hired in Japan, for purposes of targeting development activities and doing succession planning.

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