Workers' perceptions of a Japanese company's song

The Japanese company song is reputed to inspire the working morale of employees and thus contribute to overall company performance. This article investigates the psychological impact of the company song on workers by analysing the question-naire responses obtained from a group of Japanese workers. The researcher found that differences in gender and generation gap were strong explanatory variables in terms of workers' perception of non-business themes in the company song, while differences in organizational status played a significant role in explaining differences in employees' perceptions of the business-related themes. Some practical implications are also discussed.The author is from the College of Commerce and Business Administration, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.     

Transitions From Career Jobs to Retirement in Japan

Most Japanese workers are required to retire from their career firm by age 60. Yet the labor force participation rate of older men in Japan is the highest among industrialized countries, and most Japanese express a strong desire to continue working past age 60. One explanation for this paradox is that many firms reemploy their own retirees or provide them with assistance in finding new jobs with their subsidiaries or client firms.     

New Evidence on Initial Transition from Career Job to Retirement in Japan

The interval in time between leaving a career job and exit from the labor force is especially long for Japanese employees. We examine determinants of post‐career work arrangements from two perspectives: work status and the route to a second job. We show that these determinants differ between male and female workers and that the customary function of career employers to place their workers in a second job has declined since the middle of the 1990s.     

The Union Wage Effect in Japan

Previous studies point to Japanese labor unions’ lack of bargaining power that results from their organization at an enterprise level. However, a detailed examination of the institutional setting backed by the Labor Standard Law and Trade Union Law reveals that unions have strong bargaining power against deteriorating work conditions. This paper examines the effect of unions on wages using the Japanese General Social Surveys 2000–2003, which cover a period of economic stagnation. We find a robust union wage premium for both males and females. A Cotton–Neumark decomposition reveals that about one‐fifth of union workers’ higher wage is explained by the difference in the union and nonunion wage structures. We also can confirm the union wage compression effect using the DiNardo, Fortin, and Lemieux (1996 ) method. Union workers are likely to think that they will not find jobs with similar compensation packages if they leave their current jobs. In summary, unions in Japan contribute to an increase in the average wage and compress the wage distribution among their workers. This result is reconciled with previous findings by considering the uniqueness of the macroeconomic conditions of the sample period.     

Japanese Companies in Germany: A Case Study in Cross-Cultural Management

From a series of qualitative interviews with Japanese managers and German managers and workers in thirty-one Japanese-owned companies in the Düsseldorf region of western Germany, this article discusses differences in cultural patterns and organizational styles between the German and Japanese employees and the problems these pose for communication, cooperation, and morale. First, we deal with cultural contrasts: language issues, interpersonal styles (personability and politeness), and norms regarding the taking of responsibility. Second, we examine the impact on cross-nationality relations of established organizational practice: for example, German specialism vs. Japanese generalism; direct and vertical vs. indirect and incremental decision making. We also discuss efforts by these firms to find compromise systems that would meet the needs and interests of both sides. The third focus is the reactions of Japanese companies in North Rhine-Westphalia to German unions, works councils, and codetermination regulations. In the labor view, Japanese firms overall do no better or worse than comparable German firms.     

College Quality and Earnings in the Japanese Labor Market

The motivations underlying the pursuit of college prestige in Japan presumes a labor market that rewards workers according to the quality of the college that they attended. Yet studies that examine the relationship between college quality and earnings in Japan remain few and are riddled with shortcomings. This article examines the returns to college education among Japanese men using a 1995 cross-sectional data set. I find that college quality significantly improves earnings. My findings confirm that college quality plays a crucial role in shaping incentives and earnings in the Japanese labor market.     

‘Communities of resistance’ and the use of newspaper discussion boards: Polish workers in Japanese foreign investments

This article examines the content of 200 posts on newspaper discussion boards by workers in a cluster of Japanese foreign investments in Poland. The conclusions are first, that the material experiences of workers generate a set of themes in relation to the labour process with regard to wages and working conditions, bullying and monitoring that exhibit similarities across countries. Second, we argue that an analysis of the discourse used is shaped by political and institutional conditions, which reveal national differences in how workers perceive and locate their exploitation. Finally, in relation to debates about workers’ resistance and the use of the Internet we argue that the interaction of themes related to the material experience of work are intertwined with institutionally embedded understandings of exploitation, which not only enable a shared framework for venting, but also provide the basis for a community of resistance.     

High Performance Work Practices and Employee Voice: A Comparison of Japanese and Korean Workers

Using a unique new cross‐national survey of Japanese and Korean workers, we report the first systematic evidence on the effects on employee voice of High Performance Work Practices (HPWPs) from the two economies that are noted for the wide use of HPWPs. We find for both nations that: (i) workers in firms with HPWPs aimed at creating opportunities for employees to get involved (such as shopfloor committees and small group activities) are indeed more likely to have stronger senses of influence and voice on shopfloor decision making than other workers; (ii) workers whose pay is tied to firm performance are more likely to have a stake in firm performance and hence demand such influence and voice; and (iii) consequently workers in firms with HPWPs are more likely to make frequent suggestions for productivity increase and quality improvement. As such, this paper contributes to a small yet growing new empirical literature that tries to understand the actual process and mechanism through which HPWPs lead to better enterprise performance.     

Human Resource Management in the Japanese Financial Institution Abroad: The Case of the London Office

The evidence on human resource management in overseas offices of Japanese multinational service-sector firms is far less abundant than that for manufacturing firms. Existing studies describe employment practices that vary, both between firms and over time. To supplement the existing body of evidence, the present study investigates employment practices at two Japanese financial services firms in the City of London through the use of interviews and questionnaire surveys. It focuses on those facets of the ‘Japanese’ management system that may be considered fundamental characteristics: recruitment and selection procedures, training methods, pay and promotion policies, employment security, company culture, and the position of workers within the overall organization. The study considers the implications of changes over time within the two firms when viewed in the context of the existing evidence; such comparison suggests that both corporate strategy and human resource management policy in Japanese financial organizations may have changed during the 1980s.     

Demystifying the Japanese miracle

In this English translation of a book first published in Japan in 1973 Satoshi Kamata indicts the Toyota Motor company for its inhumane treatment of temporary workers on the assembly line. Kamata is a freelance journalist who records in diary form his six months' experience and observations as a temporary worker for Toyota. For the reviewer, Stephen Wood, the importance of the book lies in its contribution to the demystification of the Japanese employment system, especially in the light of the world-wide concern with Japanese methods. Wood concurs with much of Ronald Dore's introduction to the English edition of Kamata's book but suggests that to draw conclusions about management authority and work organization from it would need more systematic evidence and a sharper set of conceptual distinctions than even those Dore works with.     

The Incidence and Effect of Job Training among Japanese Women

Using panel data of Japanese women, this paper analyzes who participates in firm‐initiated training programs and the effect of this participation on wage level and wage growth. The analysis found that workers with stronger educational backgrounds are more likely to participate in firm‐initiated training activities. Training participation and wage are positively correlated. Even after controlling for endogenous selection into training participation by a first‐difference estimation, current training participation significantly explains current wage growth.     

Mechanisms to improve labor productivity by performing telework

This study investigates mechanisms underlying the influence of telework on labor productivity in Japan. First, this study finds that appropriate telework hours increase labor productivity, but when telework hours are too long, telework decreases labor productivity. Second, telework increases life satisfaction, and life satisfaction improves labor productivity. However, telework increases the stress of balancing work and domestic chores, contrary to Japanese governmental expectations, and the stress decreases life satisfaction. The stress, fortunately, does not directly reduce labor productivity. Although telework increases happiness and work satisfaction, these factors do not influence labor productivity. Third, this study clarifies that telework is more efficient for improving labor productivity if workers commute more than 1 h or commute by trains or buses that are usually very crowded during rush hours in Japan. Finally, the effect of telework for workers who have a greater number of potential trivial duties is insignificantly larger. Supervisors and colleagues often ask others to perform trivial, extra tasks without regard for schedules. Telework may help workers avoid such trivial duties and increase labor productivity. However, the importance of trivial duties is also demonstrated in this study.     

Evading Surveillance and Making Time: an Ethnographic View of the Japanese Factory Floor in Britain

A core element of the debate surrounding Japanese manufacturing transplants is the capacity of management to suppress employee resistance. This paper reports a study based on an eight-week period of participant observation of a particular form of resistance, fiddles. It argues that the opportunity for fiddling stems from the organization's inability to control its buyer–supplier relationships, temperamental technology, and the ability of workers to manipulate standard operating procedures. Moreover, it suggests that fiddles operate mainly with the consent of supervisors, and ultimately are not in conflict with interests of management as they contribute to production targets.     

Localisation of Japanese subsidiaries in Southeast Asia

The success story of Japanese firms, both in their home country and their overseas subsidiaries, has been the focus of comparative management research in the 1970s and early 1980s. Several scholars attributed the impressive productivity gains in Japanese industries to the basic principles of Japanese management. Further, they advocated the adoption of these principles by American and European businesses to solve employee morale and productivity problems. However, in recent years, the validity of the “happy worker” hypothesis in explaining the effectiveness of Japanese management has been seriously questioned. In fact, the results of several empirical studies indicate that Japanese firms are facing manpower management problems both at home and in their overseas subsidiaries. The main purpose of this article is to identify and discuss the Japanese management problems of overseas subsidiaries, based on several empirical studies of Japanese overseas subsidiaries undertaken by the authors of this article and other scholars during the last 17 years (1968 to 1985). These studies are:

Localisation Problems of Japanese Subsidiaries Overseas: A Comparative Study in Southeast-Asian Countries.

A comparative study of American, Japanese and local firms in Taiwan.

A comparative study of American, European and Japanese multinationals' subsidiaries in Brazil, Peru, India, Malaysia, Singapore, and Thailand.

A comparative study of American, German, and Japanese multinations in the United States, Western European countries, Australia, and Japan.

A comparative study of upper-level Japanese and American managers of subsidiaries of Japanese firms in the United States.

A comparative study of subsidiaries of American and Japanese multinationals in Singapore.

An intensive case study of a Japanese subsidiary in Australia.

     

Japanese management style in China? Production practices in Japanese manufacturing plants

Through an examination of twenty Japanese owned manufacturing plants in China, this article seeks to question the usefulness of identifying Japanese competitive success as being associated with specific Japanese production management techniques. Rather Japanese plants adopt, seemingly profitably, various and differentiated production methods, depending on local and parent company circumstances.     

How Different Are Human Resource Practices in Japanese “Transplants” in the United Kingdom?

Are the practices in Japanese plants really prototypical of a universal commitment-maximizing approach, or do they largely mirror local conventions? The research reported here aims to address this question by comparing the personnel practices of Japanese manufacturing plants in the United Kingdom and a similar sample of non-Japanese plants. It shows that the extent of high-commitment management is significantly higher among the Japanese plants and moreover that the practices associated with it are used in distinctive ways. As such there is no evidence of a wholesale “Japanization” of British industry. The study shows that the difference between Japanese and non-Japanese plants partly reflects their being Japanese, although the Japanese seniority plus merit pay (nenko) system has not been fully adopted. Nor is the current extent of fully fledged just-in-time in Japanese plants sufficient to account for the difference; yet the author concludes by suggesting that their managements' commitment to developing this still may be crucial.     

日本纺织产业转型研究：基于政府的视角

日本政府针时纺织产业衰退采取了短期和长期相互结合的政策。政策的实施维护了日本社会秩序和政治局面的稳定，实现了产业结构合理化和高级化，而且在规模缩减的情况下，纺织产业重新焕发出活力。日本政府促进纺织产业转型的成功经验给予我国重要启示。     

Buyer-supplier relations in the UK - automotive industry: Strategic implications of the Japanese manufacturing model

This paper documents the adoption of the Japanese model of manufacturing in the U.K. motor industry. Internal developments by the vehicle assemblers and their suppliers are examined. It is argued that the Japanese model involves very high intra- and interorganizational dependencies. Although this does not cause problems in Japan due to the structure of the Japanese motor industry, the structure of the UK vehicle industry presents severe obstacles to the successful use of Japanese methods. Pursuit of the pure Japanese model within the existing industry structure appears to be fraught with problems. Moreover, such an exercise risks sweeping away potential strengths of the existing structure.     

Supplier relations and management: A survey of Japanese,Japanese-transplant,and U.S. auto plants

This article presents the results of a questionnaire survey sent to a sample of automobile manufacturers in the United States and Japan (including Japanese-managed plants in the United States) during the spring of 1990. The data support observations that Japanese and U.S. practices tend to differ in key areas and Japanese suppliers perform better in dimensions such as quality (defects) and prices (meeting targets, reducing prices over time); and that Japanese-managed auto plants established in the United States have, in general, adopted Japanese practices and receive extremely high levels of quality from Japanese as well as U.S. suppliers. These findings provide evidence that Japanese practices and performance levels are transferable outside Japan and suggest that considerable improvements are possible for U.S. suppliers supplying U.S. auto plants. In addition, the survey indicates that U.S. firms have adopted at least some practices traditionally associated with Japanese firms, apparently reflecting some convergence toward Japanese practices and higher performance levels in supplier management.     

The Structure of the Wage Gap for Temporary Workers: Evidence from Australian Panel Data

This study uses panel data for Australia to estimate the wage differential between workers in temporary jobs and workers in permanent jobs. It is the first study to use unconditional quantile regression methods in combination with fixed effects to examine how this gap varies over the entire wage distribution. While the wages of fixed‐term contract workers are found to be similar to those of permanent workers, low‐paid casual workers experience a wage penalty and high‐paid casual workers a wage premium compared to their permanent counterparts. Temporary agency workers also usually receive a wage premium, which is particularly large for the most well paid.