Cultural Considerations

You see a lot of differences between Japanese and Americans, not just the approach to leading and managing in the workplace directly, but the approach to the business as a process. These differences are highlighted in the approach to the production of cells. In the Japanese model, workers are involved in the functioning of cells and produce the highest quality product possible. They are required to get it right the first time, but is not expected to face (and culturally would not think to deal with) the way in which business decisions are made on the corporate vision and how society is organized and run. They would make recommendations on human resources operations.

American workers have very different experience. The American worker feels very free to ask questions about how the company is running, suggesting the improvement of corporate vision, and to speak on the quality of management. This last thought is particularly interesting, as it addresses the fundamental difference between Western (synthesized by the Americans) and East (exemplified by the Japanese). And 'the democratic character of the West in general and Americans in particular, considered against the culture of Confucianism in Asia in general, and for that matter, the Japanese, which marks the dividing line for this whole topic.

To take note of a current development, the performance of the Japanese in the international business community, is troubled by the changing demographics of the Japanese population, and it is clear that such social ills are disrupting the U.S. economy. The aging of the population, troubled housing market, and a weakened banking program very puzzling problems for the professional and academic communities.

There is a problem with measurable methods in general because of cultural differences? The problem is not as significant as has been observed as a result of some cultural shift in the last ten or fifteen years. The Japanese at first did not seem interested in hiring Western managers for the plants were transferred to Western nations. They wanted to use essentially the Western workers in Japanese management. Had not considered the cultural differences between Japanese workers and workers of the West. This has had some unusual results, and, of course, unintentional.

Workers who once felt free to discuss with the managers on the process have now been rejected, and fail to meet their new manager. After some time, the Japanese added some leaders, supervisors and managers of low-level managers with Japanese shadow. Their approach evolved to the point that plants with local leaders who report to their Japanese corporate leadership.

But that means continuous improvement theory is discredited? It means that the theory is reviewed kaizen well defined? Not any more than management theory is discredited. Rather, quality management is reviewed all the time. All theories go through periods of popularity-like fashion, and all reach a point of review. Academics and business leaders will constantly want to determine if there is a better way to get the best quality and the right product for the first time, with minimal effort and resource requirements.

There are certainly different approaches in order to create a product and how to induce workers to produce that product. But in the end, the goal is to obtain a high quality product with minimal effort. The Japanese are culturally different from the Americans, as both are coming to recognize. They are trying to figure out how to get the final result in spite of these important differences. The monitoring systems that will use it will have some similarities to their predecessors, but it will grow and evolve as well .......