MANAGEMENT

An inside view of 'Japan inc.'A.W. Livingstone, B.Sc, Ph.D., C.Eng., M.I.E.E.

Indexing term: Engineering administration and management

Abstract: An engineer from the British Telecom Research Laboratory at Martlesham Heath recently spent sixmonths as part of a research group at the Musashino Electrical Communication Laboratory of Nippon Tele-graph and Telephone in Tokyo. The aim of the visit was to participate in a research project to the mutualbenefit of the two organisations. The visit also provided the opportunity to examine at first hand the workingpractices and background of the engineers who have made Japan into the world's foremost industrial nation.The observations indicate that a dramatic improvement in the effectiveness of British engineering is necessary ifwe are to remain a competitive industrial society.

1 Introduction

The growth rate of the Japanese economy since 1945 hasbeen prodigious. Until the 1970s it impinged very little onother economies, the Japanese being stereotyped as pro-ducers of cheap copies of western goods. Then, in 1973, theoil crisis produced a worldwide recession, yet the economyof Japan, a country with no natural resources, chargedahead with hardly a 'blip' in its growth rate. In the late1970s, having captured the world ship-building and auto-mobile markets, the Japanese standard of living matchedthat of the USA. The Japanese had achieved supremacy inmicroelectronics and computers by 1980, and were theworld's principal trading nation, being the number-oneexporter to all other major countries.

The recent upsurge of interest in Japan has produced alarge number of books and television documentaries whichhave resulted in a popular view of how Japanese societyand industry function. Their economy is typified as beingdriven by huge export markets which are supplied by anenthusiastic labour force working long hours for lowwages, or by robots who work even longer hours. Aboveall else there is the concept of 'Japan inc.', the triumverateof industry, government and banking which attacks prob-lems in unison, fortified by the consensus of all the partici-pants. Needless to say, the truth does not always match thepopular public image.

The new interest in industrial Japan has led severalorganisations to foster relationships with Japanese com-panies. In particular, British Telecom (BT) has instigated aseries of engineering exchanges with Nippon Telegraphand Telephone (NTT), a public corporation with similarmarkets, system size and financial performance. TheDepartment of Trade and Industry is also anxious to fosterindustrial co-operation between the UK and Japan. TheDepartment offers fellowships under the visiting engineersscheme to enable British engineers to work in Japaneseindustry. This paper is based on the experiences of aBritish Telecom engineer who spent six months in an NTTresearch laboratory as the first of the BT/NTT exchangeand the first under the visiting engineers scheme. The factthat the experience was gained in the research laboratoryof a public corporation is clearly a limitation to its gener-ality. However, the time was principally spent as the only'gaijin' (literally, outside person) among the 2400 Japaneselaboratory staff, so it was as close as possible to Japan'sonly natural asset, its workforce.

Paper 3106A (M3/M4), received 9th January 1984

The author is with the British Telecom Research Laboratories, Martlesham Heath,Ipswich IP5 7RE, England

2 Nippon Telegraph and Telephone

Nippon Telegraph and Telephone Public Corporation is avery similar organisation to British Telecom as it wasdirectly after the separation from the Post Office inOctober 1980. Research and development accounts for 2%of the total corporation's expenditure, about £200 million.There are four laboratories: Musashino, Ibaraki, Yoko-suka and Atsugi. Atsugi is the newest laboratory employ-ing 450 people on circuit development on silicon, GaAsand Josephson-junction technology. Ibaraki and Yoko-suka concentrate on optical components and systems,while the main laboratory is at Musashino. The totalnumber of staff employed in the laboratories is 3600, ofwhich 75% are actively involved in research and develop-ment (R&D). Although their plans are not as far advancedas those for BT, NTT is also preparing for privatisation.

3 The country

Stated bluntly, Japan's vital statistics are that it has oneand a half times the land area of UK with twice the popu-lation and no natural resources. Of the total land mass,only about 20% is habitable and most of that is used forfarming. As in most other industrial countries, there is asteady drift of population to the cities, and it is estimatedthat by 1985 73% of the population will be living on 3.4%of the land [1]. That is equivalent to a population of 85million people living in three average English counties, saySuffolk, Essex and Kent. Not surprisingly, this hugepacking density of the population has a remarkable impacton day-to-day life in the country.

The principal economic facts of Japanese life are sum-marised in Figs. 1-4. The need to import all their oil, gasand coal has encouraged the Japanese to be very frugal intheir use of energy. Even so, as Fig. 1 shows, their depen-dence on outside energy sources is very high, especiallywhen compared with the USA or UK. A great deal of thecountry's food also has to be imported; only in the area ofrice production is there significant home production.Indeed, with double cropping and very intensive cultiva-tion, the Japanese are self-sufficient in rice production.Unfortunately, this situation has been achieved at a timewhen rice consumption is falling in comparison to grain inthe form of bread. This means that the government has totempt farmers to grow grain on small, uneconomic fields,while continuing to subsidise the rice production whichcreated those same farming techniques.

It is in the area of gross national product (GNP) thatthe achievement of Japan has been most significant, rising

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100

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Japan USA Germany France UK

Fig. 1 Dependence on energy imports (1979)

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Fig. 2 Gross national product {1979)

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Fig. 4 Comparison of Japanese wage rates with those of USAComposite of data from Vogel, Woronoffand Japanese ministry of labour

JapanUSA = 1

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from zero in 1945 to be second only to the USA in 1979, asshown in Fig. 2. One of the more common misconceptionsabout Japan is that this large GNP is achieved throughhuge export markets. In fact, as Fig. 3 shows, in terms ofGNP Japan's imports and exports are way behind those ofits European counterparts and only slightly larger thanthose of the USA. This means that the economy of thecountry is driven by huge internal consumption, a factorwhich will be discussed later in connection with the finan-cial problems facing the country. It is also generallythought that Japan's workforce provides a pool of cheaplabour. That situation certainly existed after 1945, andeven into the 1970s the average hourly wage rates werelower than their industrial competitors, but, as can be seenfrom Fig. 4, the explosion in wage rates in recent years hasturned the Japanese workforce into one of the most expen-sive in the world. Although it is difficult to make directcomparisons, some commentators estimate that Japanesewage rates passed those of the USA in 1978.

4 Electronics industry: an overview

In the 1970s electronics production in Japan doubled andexports quadrupled with no increase in personnel. Thetotal value in 1980, the latest available data, was $40billion (taking 1 $ = 200 yen) split almost equally betweenconsumer products, components and industrial equipment.Approximately half the total production was exported, aproportion the Japanese feel is low.

The continuing growth in the production of electronicequipment has firmly established Japan's position assecond only to the USA. In 1979 Japan produced 25% ofthe world total, compared with the USA's 66%. In com-parison, only 6% of the USA market was supplied fromJapan, whereas 24% of the Japanese market was suppliedfrom the USA; from Electronics in Japan, 1981: 'In spite ofsuch conclusive statistics the USA still complains ofJapan's share of the market as "damaging" and "amenace"'. One possible reason is the extraordinary successof Japanese semiconductor memory sales in the USA;running at 40% in 1979, the country's share of the 64 kRAM market was up to 70% by 1981. The Japanese them-selves put this down to better product reliability, mainly asa result of quality-control circles, groups of employees con-cerned with the manufacturing process. Semiconductormanufacturers also enjoy an enviable position in terms ofthe domestic market. Only ten companies produce over90% of all semiconductors, and each of these companieshas a wide range of other products, with semiconductorsusually a small fraction of the total. In the USA, on theother hand, apart from a few large operations, the prin-cipal semiconductor manufacturers are small venturebusinesses.

There are two main differences between the funding ofresearch in Japan and in the West. In most Western coun-tries, the total R&D expenditure compared with GNP isvery similar to the Japanese figure, typically between 1.5and 2.5%. The difference is that a large portion of that isspent on defence, which encourages low-volume high-costdevelopments rather than the sort of product which doeswell in the domestic market place. In Japan only 2% of theR&D budget is spent on defence. Similarly, in Japan, onlya small proportion of the R&D budget comes directlyfrom the government, the rest being direct investment bycompanies in products which they expect to be profitable.The major R&D programmes in Japan are oftenannounced as very large financial packages. In fact, theamount of government money being offered as an induce-

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ment is frequently surprisingly small and spread overseveral years [2].

5 Japanese companies

The size and diversity of Japanese companies is one of thereasons suggested by the Japanese for the success of theirsemiconductor industry in providing high-quality com-ponents. Companies like Mitsubishi, Hitachi and Toshibaappear in every manufacturing field: cars, ships, aircraft,trains, consumer electronics, power stations and pencils.Mostly, the large companies have grown up around onevery competent entrepeneur with great skill and imagina-tion. Around him at higher management levels are thepolicy makers, who consciously drive the whole company,not just their own division. At this level is the consensuswhich is such a strong feature of Japanese managementand planning, allowing resources, both of money andpeople, to be moved within the organisation for the overallgood. Several companies have strong banking interests.

New recruits to a company still expect to stay with thatcompany until the end of their careers. The indications arethat the situation is changing; since 1965 the number ofpeople under 24 years old who would like, one day, tochange their job has risen from 5% to about 13%.However, the practicality of moving companies suggeststhat only a very small number will achieve that ambition.The reality is that the worker in a large organisation is sosurrounded by the company that he never seriously con-siders the possibility of changing his employer.

Employees of large companies can live their entire lifewithin the confines of the company. Company housing is astandard feature of the larger employers, including 'dor-mitories' for single engineers. A twelve-hour day is verycommon in research and development laboratories, andthe major part of that day is very effectively spent. Thefive-day week is relatively unknown, although it is a majordemand among the stronger labour unions. Less than one-tenth of the working population have a completely freeweekend. If an engineer is willing to spend his entirewaking week at work, anything which might deflect himfrom that intention must be avoided. All such distractionsare duly taken care of by providing every possible serviceand facility at work. Naturally, there are canteens whichwill provide a range of meals from breakfast to dinner.There are supermarkets which sell clothing, electricalgoods, books, sports goods, shoes, toothpaste; in fact, anyitem needed to operate one's life. In addition, there arehairdressers, dentists and doctors to minimise the timeneeded to attend even to these unavoidable functions.Many large companies also operate their own hospitalsand hotels.

Not all Japan's workforce is as efficient as the engi-neering and production segments. The service and admin-istrative segments of industry are notoriously inefficientand under-utilise the skills of the employees. In 1978, astudy by the Tokyo Institute of Technology showed thatthe effectiveness of these areas was way behind that of theUSA. There is every indication that as manufacturingindustry becomes more effective the number of employeesin the service industries will increase with no discernableimprovement in productivity.

6 Work skills

The ability and productivity of the Japanese engineeringworkforce has been the main contributory factor in thecountry's phenomenal growth. Engineers form a very high

proportion of the total population, a population which, ingeneral, is very technically minded and, according to arecent report, has a higher IQ than is the norm in theWest. Education is taken very seriously with a standardfive and a half day school week. In addition, over half ofJapanese youths attend supplementary schools to helpthem pass the entrance examinations which are required atall levels of the educational system. Six years of high-school education is completed by 90% of the population,and almost 40% of Japanese males in their mid-twentieshave completed four-year college courses compared withabout 20% in America.

An engineer's mental and technical competence is themost important single factor in the success of theirresearch activity. This is most dramatically seen in the useof complex test and fabrication equipment. This allows theengineer to use a much wider range of equipment than iscommon in the West, which has the major benefit that heunderstands much more clearly the wide range of technicalconstraints which are important to his research, ratherthan relying on second-hand analysis. This is one of thereasons for the smoother transfer of research to pro-duction. One is tempted to think that skills spread sothinly could not be efficient, but the results speak for them-selves; given the same piece of machinery, a smaller Japa-nese team can achieve better results in a shorter time.

The Japanese themselves think that they are not cre-ative; they share a national shame at the small number ofJapanese Nobel-Prize winners. This lack of creativity wasone of the reasons the Japanese made the approach toother countries concerning the 'fifth generation computerproject'. In practice, there is a lack of imagination andinventiveness shown in some of their research work. Oneof the reasons is the Japanese education system; althoughit produces people with a high level of technical andmental skills, it is very intensive and, particularly becauseof their alphabet, relies heavily on rote learning. In theengineering environment, creativity is also hampered bythe intensity with which the work is pursued. The morecapable the engineer, the more intensely he will attack aproblem, spending at least 12 hours a day directlyinvolved, every day. There is just no time to sit back andlook at a project in alternative ways or even to question itspurpose. Having said that there is evidence of lack of cre-ativity in some engineers, the importance of that observa-tion should not be overestimated. One has only to look atthe market place to see evidence of Japan's creative ability;an extraordinary range of products selling extremely wellin areas where there was previously no market at all.

7 Management skills

Many of the Japanese management skills are, of course, nodifferent to those employed elsewhere; Takeo Fujisawa,cofounder of the Honda Motor Company, observed that'Japanese and American management is 95% the same anddiffers in all important respects'. That elusive 5% is splitalmost equally between keeping the workforce content andmotivated, and the techniques used by the Japanese havelittle relevance to the West, if indeed they have much rele-vance to the Japan of the future.

The Japanese themselves think that their 'bottom-up'management and agreement by consensus are the mostimportant aspects of the management techniques.Although both techniques exist by the Japanese definitionof the terms, in the context of Western management thereality is somewhat different. Certainly there is consensus,as we understand it, at higher management levels. MITI

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drives industry very much by consensus. However, there isstrong evidence that at lower levels consensus means 'lackof disagreement' rather than 'agreement'. The fact that theJapanese accept, without question, so much of theirworking conditions, means that Japanese management hasconcentrated on aspects which are not applicable to man-agement in the West. The Japanese have concentrated onkeeping the workforce content in areas outside the directsphere of work by providing social services which theWestern worker assumes to be his own responsibility.These cover company housing, shopping and other ame-nities at work, medical facilities and social events.

If Japanese top management has an attitude whichdiffers significantly from that of their counterparts in theWest, it is in their approach to market share. Having alarge market share is the single most important facet ofJapanese management strategy, explaining, at least in part,the many large companies. In the eyes of the Japanese, thesize of a company is more important than its overall prof-itability.

8 The group

The group is extremely important throughout Japanesesociety and has great relevance to the performance of indi-viduals within the company framework. Psychologistssuggest that the cramped living conditions, and the ten-dency for children to spend early years in very close prox-imity to their parents, leads to a need for thecompanionship provided by social groups later in life.Westerners living in Japan for any length of time, particu-larly if they have used Tokyo's famed transport system,can be excused for thinking that the Japanese are unhappyif they are not actually rubbing shoulders with at least fiveother people. The Japanese are by nature very shy, andmany facets of group membership help them alleviate thatproblem by formalising introductions and relationships.Many of the groupings are familiar in the West: sportsclubs, debating societies, religious and artistic groups.However, two groups are very much stronger: thoseformed at work and during education.

Contemporaries at school, and particularly at uni-versity, retain very strong connections with each otherlong after their studies are over. They meet regularly, andkeep track of their contemporaries with much more enthu-siasm than is common elsewhere. Japanese industry oper-ates on a seniority system of management; members of acontemporary group move through their own and othercompanies at very similar rates. This means that the con-temporary group from any one university, for example, hasmembers at roughly the same level in a wide range ofindustries and the Civil Service, including the powerfulministries such as MITI. This is an excellent mechanismfor business exchange between companies which isexploited to the full.

Clearly, the group formed at work is very important,the average employee spending considerably more timewith his workmates than at home or with his family orother friends. The ratio is reversed, almost exactly, inEurope. The group work in very close physical proximitydue to very cramped accommodation, and it is essentialthat personal relationships are good. Management appre-ciate this, and steps are taken to ensure that facilities areavailable for social activity.

At work the group performs well, not only because itsmembers are encouraged to have common interests, butbecause it is lacking in any divisive influences due to per-sonal ambition. This arises partly from the system of pro-

motion of individuals by seniority. Every new intake ofemployees is grouped according to its year of entry and thestream it entered to form a 'peer' group. In general, thesegroups are promoted together step by step. However, it isrecognised that there are variations of ability within thesegroups, and complications arise because of an unwrittenlaw of Japanese industrial life which does not allow anemployee to be subordinate to anyone in the same orlower peer group. The problem is partly resolved byhaving graded research groups so that the more able engi-neers end up in an 'able' group, marginally ahead of theirpeers. There seems to be no conflict when staff are super-vised by less able managers who hold their position solelyby seniority. The Japanese temperament resolves thisdilemma by placing the emphasis on group rather thanindividual achievement.

The main flaw in such a system would be the tendencyfor the less well motivated to be content to be at the lowerend of their peer group, carried along by the general pro-motional scheme. However, Japanese pride protectsagainst complacency; in a society where status is allimportant, the knowledge that one was low in one's peergroup would be sufficient incentive to work harder.

Status in Japanese society is almost inseparable fromthe group concept. Its most prevelant manifestation is inthe bow, which is used as a universal greeting both inbusiness and socially. At first sight, it seems an anachron-ism to the Western observer, yet in that single act thestatus of an individual is recognised and appreciated,merely by the depth and duration of a bow. It is in thiscontext that the habit of exchanging business cards isreadily understood. The exchanging of cards on firstacquaintance ensures that, even in that very first meeting,status is established and recognised.

For all the quaint characteristics that the group ofworkmates may have, it is an extraordinarily powerfulunit. The cohesiveness of the group in the workingenvironment and the total lack of divisivness caused bypersonality or ambition is very evident in the workplace.All that matters is the success of the group. Yet, whenanalysed, the group in Japanese society probably functionsbecause of phychological characteristics which are notfound anywhere else. Japanese management has produceda system which stimulates, encourages and then manipu-lates that group to devastating effect.

9 MITI and the ministries

Of all the institutions which are linked to the success ofJapan's engineering industry, the Ministry of InternationalTrade and Industry (MITI) is the most renowned. Thestatus of the ministries, and the status enjoyed by theirmembers, is enhanced by the general public's respect foreducational achievement. The elite band of civil servants,who form the upper echelon of the ministries, are poorlypaid, work longer hours than anyone else in the entirepopulation, and are the cream of the Japanese educationalsystem.

Most of the high-flyers in the ministries are recruitedfrom Tokyo University. Using the ties which have beendescribed earlier gives these bureaucrats access to a widerange of similarly qualified people throughout industry.These ties and the status of the ministries are very impor-tant to MITI in its dealings with industry because MITIhas almost no statutory powers. Its main function is topressure industry into accepting ideas partly by spendingmoney, partly by providing assistance in technical areasbut principally by providing the companies with first-class

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advice. It achieves its results by consensus, an overworkedword when discussing Japan in general, but very relevantin this context. In practice, it appears that if the companiescan be persuaded to sit down and talk to each other forlong enough, with high-quality technical inputs from MITIabout future technology, the companies themselves decidethat projects like the 'fifth generation computer' are worth-while. Having made that decision, one of Japan's manage-ment characteristics takes over, i.e. market share is allimportant; if there is seen to be a product which will havea viable future, every company will wish to be involved;the concept of leaving a market to another company is notconsidered.

MITI's role in helping Japan reach its present state oftechnical development is of great importance. It is too easyfor the West to say that MITI is spending large amountsof money and pressuring industry to adopt certain atti-tudes. In fact, 'the governments of Britain, France andWest Germany each spend more to support electronicstechnology than their counterparts in Tokyo' (Reference 2,p. 14). However, the companies listen to MITI becausethey know that the advice they are given will be worthlistening to, and the policy of industrial 'targetting' has cer-tainly worked well for Japan under MITI supervision.

10 Standard of living

The Japanese are now one of the most expensive work-forces in the world. This is reflected in their level of dispos-able income, although direct comparisons of standard ofliving are difficult because of the expense of privatehousing in the country and the provision of so much sub-sidised housing by the larger companies.

The spread in earnings in Japan is one of the smallest inthe world, and engineers sit neatly in the centre of the dis-tribution. Most annual salaries are based on 12 conven-tional monthly payments plus two bonuses paid in Julyand December worth an additional five months salary. Athirty-year-old research engineer earns about 4 000 000 yenp.a., which at the prevailing exchange rate is equivalent toabout £11000. Apart from housing, such a salary is worthmore than in the West, since the yen is generally con-sidered to be undervalued.

The scarcity of land and its consequent high cost have amajor effect on the Japanese lifestyle. In 1982, residentialland in Tokyo cost £750 per square metre, which meansthat private accommodation, either to rent or buy, is pro-hibitively expensive. The Japanese tend to marry ratherlate, at about 28, and up to that time they live either withparents or in company housing. Company housing is verycheap, and is available both to single staff and in familyunits. Only 7% of the whole population live in companyhousing, although in larger companies it must be nearer30%. Those members of society who are not in the privatehousing market clearly have a huge disposable incomewhich fuels the Japanese consumer industry. The popu-lation overall gives an impression of wealth, with an abun-dance of electrical and electronic goods, sports equipmentand clothes. Typically, they also have savings equivalent toone year's salary.

Land costs mean that a typical three-bedroom house insuburban Tokyo on a 60 m2 plot might cost £75000, ofwhich the land accounts for 60%. By the age of thirty, anengineer might have £30000 of personal savings to puttoward the cost, the remainder being borrowed as a fixed-interest loan with interest levels currently around 8%.Although the interest rates are low, there is very little taxbenefit, so the overall figure is very similar to that in the

UK. If one accepts the Japanese approach to housing, i.e.entering the housing market late and expecting very littlevalue for money, the Japanese standard of living in termsof disposable income is very high.

One of the means of disposing of that income is throughsport, with baseball, table tennis, volleyball, tennis, swim-ming, golf and skiing all commanding huge followings. Itdoes not come as a great surprise to learn that the Japa-nese play just as hard as they work. Nowhere is this moreapparent than in the fishing clubs which abound in andaround Tokyo. It is difficult to reconcile the Japanesereputation for high productivity with a sport where the actof merely catching a fish is normally thought of as anachievement. The contradiction is resolved by the total dis-similarity of the sports in the West and in Japan. Certainly,they use ponds just like everyone else, but these are sur-rounded by fishermen and stocked frequently by fish eagerto be caught. On one fishing trip in the foothills nearTokyo one fish per minute was certainly a reasonabletarget.

Excluding the material aspects of life, there are goodand bad aspects to living in Japan. Clearly, family life issignificantly different to that in the West. Engineersworking a 12-hour day and travelling for three hours a dayspend very little time at home. Even those in the servicesector of industry who normally work an eight- or nine-hour day do not spend any more time at home, the eve-nings being spent drinking with colleagues from work. Inmany respects the quality of life in Japan is lower than inany other city in the world; there are fewer parks, thetransport system is overcrowded and the atmosphere ispolluted biologically, visually and audibly. On the otherhand, the transport system is remarkably reliable.

The improvement in the standard of living since 1945has caused great changes in the Japanese lifestyle. Typicalfamilies are now eating significant quantities of bread andmeat rather than rice and fish. As a result, the Japanese aretaller than they were; the average 17-year-old boy is now170 cm tall (57") a full 9.5 cm more than in 1948. Alcoholconsumption is increasing; each adult last year consumedan average of 87 1, of which 5% by volume was whisky,which is fast taking over from sake as the national drink.

Japan has the lowest crime rate of any industrialsociety. From 1948 to 1973 the Japanese crime ratedropped by 50% and has continued to show an annualdecline. In the USA, per head of population, there are fivetimes more murders, 100 times more robberies and 1000times more drug offences.

The Japanese are now beginning to expect to spendmore time with their families. Certainly there is now amarked reduction in the 'on-the-go work worm' who con-siders his job more important than his family. The Uni-versity of Oklahoma's Centre for Economic andManagement Research recently compared the work ethicof the Japanese with that of the Americans. Of the Japa-nese workers, 45% thought work was the most importantpart of life and 39% thought that of the family. In theUSA the figures were 23% and 55%, respectively.Although the figures still show a preference for work, theyare moving toward typical Western values. This mustfurther jeopardise the state of the Japanese economy to thepoint where one has to wonder whether the country canhandle the social implications of a disgruntled populationliving in such close physical proximity to each other.

11 ConclusionsThe typical Western preconceptions of the Japanese areonly partly true. They do work very hard, and their living

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conditions are cramped and expensive. However, there is alarge unproductive sector of industry, the workforce is nowone of the most expensive in the world, and they do nothave as large an export market as we would like to believeor they would like to have. In many ways those facts areinteresting asides on the main issues which were the pointof the working visit to Japan.

The Japanese are intelligent, well educated and techni-cally minded. They train five times more engineers perhead of population than the UK. Those engineers worklong hours in an extremely effective manner encouraged bya management system which makes full use of their skillsby satisfying many of the needs we consider to be outsidethe scope of interference from work.

The problem which arises from these rather simpleassessments is whether or not they can be incorporated ina Western lifestyle. Significantly, the fact that the Japanesework longer hours than is normal in the West is not theirgreatest attribute. That is not because it would not beuseful in Western society, but in a Western society it wouldbe counterproductive in view of its social implications.Indeed, in many ways, the Japanese work inefficientlybecause of it. It seems clear that the current method oftackling engineering problems in Japan is to try allavenues, whereas, in the West, because of our more limitedmanpower resources, some selection is required. It is notobvious that any important developments are missedbecause of that selection process.

The major difference in the effectiveness of the engineerat work is that he is expected, encouraged and assisted tobe an engineer for as many hours as are available to himand for as many years as are possible. Management has tobe very much more efficient, not only in handling theproblems which tend to intrude in the engineers' time, butalso in motivation. In the West, there was a time whenthere were few managers who were technically qualified. Inrecent years the pendulum has swung the opposite way, tothe extent that the only reward for being a good engineeris to become a manager. Perhaps there is more to being agood manager than having been a good engineer. Our edu-cational system in the UK has fallen far behind the Japa-nese in terms of achievement. Partly, that is a question ofIQ, and in that respect the Japanese seem to have thebenefit of heredity. However, children are brought up in avery instructive atmosphere, almost from birth, and educa-tion is taken very seriously by the population as a whole.Many of the aspects of the Japanese educational systemare frowned upon in the West, particularly the rote learn-ing and the emphasis on entrance examinations. However,it has an effect which is devastating in the technical andmental competence of its product. Our universities in par-

ticular do not appear to produce the same quality of grad-uate as their Japanese equivalent.

The Japanese, and Asians in general, think that theWest's concept of their countries all come from the novelsof James Clavell. That is probably more true than eventhey think. In one of his novels, 'Nobel house', there is anirascible Scotsman who has this to say about the Japanese:'They're working hard, they're making profits and they'llbury us if we let them. . . . If we're such fools as to allow itwe deserve to go under.'

12 Acknowledgments

The visit to Japan was jointly sponsored by BritishTelecom and the Department of Industry's visiting engi-neers scheme. The author is extremely grateful for theopportunity to have undertaken the visit and wishes tothank most sincerely J.S. Whyte, C. May, R. Brander, andDr. D. Newman, all of British Telecom Research Labor-atories, Dr. L. Goldstone, of the Department of Trade andIndustry, Dr. F. Steele, of the Fellowship of Engineering,and Dr. C. Bradley, of the British Embassy in Tokyo.

Throughout the stay in Japan, all the staff of NTT wereextremely kind and helpful. Every assistance was given, notonly in the research work which was undertaken, but alsoto see other laboratories and projects, to take part in theirsocial functions and to attend their conferences.

13 References

1 WORONOFF, J.: 'Inside Japan inc.' (Lotus Press, Tokyo, 1982),p. 259

2 CASEMENT, R.: 'The innovative Japanese', The Economist, June 191982, pp. 5-32

14 Bibliography

The following books and articles are listed for thoselooking for an interesting introduction to Japan and itsindustry:

BOYER, E.: 'How Japan manages declining industries', Fortune, 1983,107, pp. 34-39MALONEY, D.: 'Japan: its not all raw fish', Japan Times, 1975PASCALE, R.T., and ATHOS, A.G.: 'The art of Japanese management'(Penguin, 1981)REISCHAUER, F.O.: The Japanese' (C.E. Tuttle, Tokyo, 1977)VOGEL, E.F.: 'Japan as number one: lessons for America' (C.E. Tuttle,Tokyo, 1979)WORONOFF, J.: 'Japan's wasted workers' (Lotus Press, Tokyo, 1981)

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