Many a little makes a mickle

Japanese proverb by direct translation is “Stacking dust will become a mountain”.
Specially in Japanese manufactures companies, this proverb and mind is wide spread, because “Kaizen” type activities needs this mentality. However it is awful they always believe this method is right even when they face to new world and need to take the risks to break it. This method can fit only some target is already exit and they need fill the gap.

Here is original manga in Japanese.

Mr. Rainbow colors

In Japan, the number of colors in rainbow is seven.
Red, orange, yellow, green, blue, indigo, and purple.

Here is original manga in Japanese.

Mt. Organization

We have expression of “ Oyama no taishou (the boss of the mountain) ” in Japanese. This sentence includes the nuance of despising to the people who is the top of the small organization in the small world with the power to the only the people.
Even so, there are many people who want to be the boss of the small mountain and the others want to be part of the mountain.
We also have different proverb “Keiko Gyugo( The mouth of chicken is better than the tale (or hip) of the cow. = Better be the head of a dog than the tail of a lion. )”. However, the small mountain in the company doesn’t allow them to have freedom like the mouth of chicken.

Here is original manga in Japanese.

blame others for everything

The amenability is virtue in traditional Japanese culture. That is still alive in the world of Salaryman. That leads them not think anything by themselves and will start to blame others for everything.

Here is the original manga in Japanese.

how to grow

“Bonsai” is one of Japanese traditional culture to
make the art of aesthetic miniaturization of trees and so on.
In the typical case, old Japanese men have hobby to make Bonsai.

When I was in Silicon Valley, I saw American style Bonsai several time. All of them is very big comparing to Japanese one. In the case of Japanese one, one of the important factor for Bonsai is how to make it small.

Here is original Japanese manga.

Responsibility in the firm

Many Japanese salaryman respect the internal company order more than the outside change.

I guess the reason for this is that Japanese company has used the lifetime employment historically. So they became to be just interested in only the company while they worked for only one company long time.

I am afraid it is difficult for them to react correctly against the global big economy change. Just too slow.

Here is the original manga in Japanese.

The masters of the reason for the impossible

I often face this kind of situation.
Many smart Japanese salaryman makes effort with spending a lot of time to create the perfect reason why they can not do. The fundamental reason why there are many such kind people in Japan is Japanese culture does not respects the people who challenge risk. Naturally they want to be just stable without challenge and with the skill to create the reason for the impossible.

Here is the original Japanese manga.

domestic demand expansion

Since the current global recession happened, many so-called intellectuals in Japan say “We should expand the domestic demand and keep employment under the current recession.” It is very strange, because the big industry in Japan is the manufactures which already expanded their business to worldwide since long time ago.

On the other hand, even in the big Japanese manufacture companies, the population of the people who are creating just “the in-company demand expansion”, that is only for the internal, has increased. Nothing to compete to the outside competitors can be created by these. (It is obvious, though…)

For example,

- the pre-pre-pre-meeting for internal negotiation
(=eternal Nemawahi)
- the people who want to know many things even they are not related
- the imposition of who should have budget between divisions


I wonder this trend is in only Japan(?).

Here is the original manga in Japanese.

Rulesuit

In Japanese big company, tones of employees are assigned to make the rules, like lately ISMS (Information Security Management System), EMS (Environment Management System), J-SOX ( Japanese SOX act), and so on.
Of course, the rule is important and necessity. However, once they are assigned to make the rules, to make rules becomes the purpose. They don’t care about those rules may disturb the others job to do business. They are interested in how those rules are strict and no inconsistency just logically.
This is big trend which progress steadily in Japanese company, and it makes them weaker to fight with outside competitor. Some Japanese are skeptical maybe it is conspiracy by USA and Europe, because many rule has started from USA and Europe like SOX.

Here is original manga in Japanese.

fork in the road

In this global recession, unfortunately many Japanese company is type B, which they intend to do same thing as before to get stable. But the world has changed. Just stability can not help the company. It is obvious, but they want not to see it unconsciously. Maybe because Japanese economy has grown by stable quality of the products as just manufacturer.

Here is original manga in Japanese.