AMERICAN MAN-AGEMENT MODEL

VERSES JAPANESE MANAGEMENT

MODEL

Vivek Goyal

American Versus Japanese Man-agement Model

Every country is different from other. There man-agement, food, way of living and standards are all different. In some countries government is very in-fluencing while in other they are not much bother.

Such two different countries are America and Japan.

They have different cultures and management sys-tems as a by-product of culture manifests unique characteristics in both the countries.

MAJOR DIFFERENCE

American are performance oriented unlike Japanese who are perfectionist.

1. LONG TERM COMMITMENT Japanese tends to favor the development of long term relationships

and strategies over short-term gain. They spend much more time up front with a potential customer or

supplier before making a commitment unlike Americans which then allows Japanese to implement decisions much faster after a decision is made.

Moreover, in down times Japanese companies avoid layoffs and con-tract terminations contrary to Americans.

2. TRAINING AND EDUCATION

On the Job Training is an American ideology.

Communication Plaza Concept—Though this is fading in Japan, employ-ees meet with the executive informally over lunch or dinner to listen to each other.

3. GET-IN-TOUCH, LEARNING FROM FACTS

- Japanese mix with employees and customers: Japanese engineers, e.g., go to the factories, and don’t wear distinguishing

jackets or hard-hats. An insight in Japanese culture…Japanese neighbor-hoods are less stratified in terms of economic class. CEOs may live next door to engineers and factory workers where as most Americans would not consider livening next to a subordinate.

- Learn from competitor: Americans are creative, but would be smart to do more copying. Japanese are world class at copying and improving upon an idea, but would

be smart to develop their creativity.

4. EFFORT EVALUATION- Process versus Results: This seems to be the key difference between Americans and Japanese. Americans are more results oriented while Japanese focus on process

improvements. Once they learn how to do something, they work on small improvements—

they evaluate effort not results. Because Americans are process averse, they depend on manuals to tell what the results should be.

The down side of the process focus is to kill creativity. Overall, the two cul-tures should learn from each other, and become more like each other. Neither completely process nor completely results focused.

5. CUSTOMER FIRST AND SHAREHOLDER LAST

The priority order of customers and suppliers is different for U.S. and Japanesebusinesses:America1. Shareholder2. Customer3. EmployeeJapan4. Customer5. Employee6. Supplier7. Community8. Country9. ShareholderJapanese firm is organized for the employee. It is a more human orientation

6. TEAM WORK The Japanese and Americans see two different meanings behind these words. In Japan team work means to help others, here it means functional maxi-

mization, that is to improve results. This leads to a difference in the roles on the team. In Japan the team leader is

always asking team members to help more, here the team leader is responsi-ble for results.

Americans are more inclined towards individual tasks performance.

7. QUALITY FIRST, COST LAST This is the proper ranking of quality in the Japanese organization: 1. Quality 2. Quality 3. Quality 4. Cost Profit is the result of the pursuit of quality—as quality improves, costs go

down. Quality includes products, services, machines, layout, policy, planning and

organization.

8. LEARN FROM THE BEST Always look at someone better. The problem is when you get to the top, you

have to become more creative—this is Japan’s challenge Short comings of Japans practices are: Lack of Decisiveness: they are not transparent. Decisions sometimes take

too long and they loose their timing. Individual Ability Ignored: miss creative opportunities. Miss Strategic Opportunities: too much delay and time.

COMPARATIVE MANAGEMENT

Because of the success of Japanese com-panies in world markets,

Researchers have paid a special attention to the Japanese management style . As a result,

Many scholars compared the Japanese management system with the American and European system

Short-Term EmploymentIndividual Decision MakingIndividual Responsibility

Rapid Evaluation and PromotionExplicit Control MechanismsSpecialized Career Path

Segmented Concern for Employee     as a Person

Theory A (American)

Lifetime EmploymentCollective Decision MakingCollective Responsibility

Slow Evaluation and PromotionImplicit Control MechanismsNonspecialized Career PathHolistic Concern for Employee

     as a Person

Theory J (Japanese)

Long-Term EmploymentCollective Decision MakingIndividual Responsibility

Slow Evaluation and PromotionImplicit, Informal Control with

      Explicit, Formalized MeasuresModerately Specialized Career PathsHolistic Concern, Including Family

Theory Z (Modified American)

MODEL OF JAPANESE MAN-AGEMENT

Hatvany and Pucik (1981) offer a model of Japanese management in which they define three interrelated strategies:

The authors assert that these general strategies are trans-lated into specific management techniques including

Job rotation and slow promotion; Evaluation of attributes and behavior; Emphasis on work groups; Open communication; Consultative decision making; and concern for em-

ployee.

SEVEN MAJOR CHARACTER-ISTICS OF JAPANESE ORGANI-

ZATIONS Lifetime employment, Slow evaluation and promotion of employ-

ees, Non-specialized career paths, Implicit control mechanism, Collective decision making, Collective responsibility, And Holistic concern (building a complete

relationship between employer and em-ployee, including concerning with em-ployee's non-work, personal and family, matters).

The McKinsey 7-S Framework Followed by Americans

Strategy

Structure

Systems

Staff

Style

Skills

Shared goals

OrganizationManagement

Pre Theory Z

Abraham Maslow (1908–1970)– Identified sets of basic human needs and suggested

that they could be arranged in a hierarchy based on their importance to the individual.

Douglas McGregor (1906–1964)– Developed the Theory X (traditional—negative—management approach) andTheory Y (positive management approach) to workers

and work motivation.

Theory Z (Modified American Management)

 Theory Z How American Business Can Meet the Japanese Challenge (Ouchi:1981)

Theory Z workers:–  Ouchi explains that the employees must be very

knowledgeable about the various issues of the company, as well as possessing the competence to make those decisions.

– He also points out; however, that management sometimes has a tendency to underestimate the ability of the workers to effectively contribute to the decision making process

Implications of these types of theories for leaders

Modern implications for companies using these theo-ries have shown:

An improvement of people skills,. Empowering their employees. Stimulating change. Helping employees balance work with life conflicts. Improving ethical behavior. Improvements in turnover rates. Productivity, effectiveness. Efficiency. Organizational behavior Job satisfaction

CONCLUSION Douglas McGregor’s Theory X and Y, and William Ouchi’s Theory Z have

all proven to be useful in the management field. Many companies have successfully integrated similar economic and human

principles in a management style from Theory’s Y and Z. Theory’s Y and Z have both shown to be quite successful framework for

American companies. Theory X is not obsolete. The results of an empirical test of the model show that American manage-

ment style is different from the Japanese. The variability between two countries lies among the all six managerial di-

mensions as well. While American managers emphasize supervisory style, decision making,

and control mechanism, The Japanese are more concerned with communication process, interdepart-

mental relations, and paternalistic approach.