Japan Success Strategies for Life and Business

Social Media Creeps Into Japan

December 1st, 2011

Undeniably, many Japanese companies have weathered the economic doldrums for the last two decades without ever resorting to social media tactics.  Many stores and businesses have basically clung onto the leaden tactics of newspaper blurbs, paid advertisements in local papers and shopper weeklies, or just simple word-of-mouth tactics.

But in a world of choice with many online shopping portals and auction sites blooming, the days of social media indifference are numbered.  Just this past month, LinkedIn became localized in Japan and, with ongoing education in the virtual grapevine, it will in the next few tears crush the long-held custom of annual recruiting.

The same is true of Facebook, with its varied ways of building rapport with your customer or client base. Companies in the modern world must be prepared to go the extra mile using social media networks to spread the word about their products and services, address customer complaints or concerns, and educate their potential buyers about the reasons to choose their company over others.

Being social and sociable are not optional anymore, but many companies are becoming interested or concerned about how to reach customers where they hang out online.

Significantly, there is anew start-up called the Japan Social Media Manager Association which is trying to catch the social media wave.  They plan to launch a social media manager course early next year in Japan.  The trainees passing the course will be issued a certification certificate.

Social media in Japan is not a fad.  It’s a fact of life.  Main Street businesses -with proper education and training – can draw many more customers ready and willing to spend money NOW by using stealthy social media strategies, including cellphone apps with daily promotions.

The golden era social media is dawning.  If you are a great talent in social media, I may be able to help you establish your credentials in Japan.  Contact me at administrator@successinjapan.com.

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Oozing Gluttony

October 3rd, 2011

Gluttony is one of the 7 deadly sins and, unfortunately, Japan and the Japanese are not immune from it.

Human beings are often gluttons in one way or another. Americans have a tradition of gorging on high-fat, low-nutrition foods on a regular basis and have the guts to prove it. Japanese, on the other hand, have their oral fixation satisfied by cigarettes and obsessive use or abuse of the modern pacifier called a cellphone. We human beings are flawed.  One point in the Japanese lifestyle that is definitely superior is that the natives (as a group) eat slower and subsequently less than Americans do.  An American can easily vacuum up a large French Fries at McDonald’s in a New-York-minute.  The Japanese will be eating fry by fry at 15- or 30-second intervals. Some may think that the DNA of Japanese makes them much thinner than their American counterparts.  Yes, they are smaller by and large than Americans and they do have eating habits which foster optimum health passed on from older generations.   But that inbred advantage is quickly fading as American fast-food culture invades.

 

Although bigger is becoming better in miniature Japan, I implore marketers to be responsible and market quality products in Japan in proportion to the size of this nation and its people. Gluttony sells well because it unmasks the base desire of all human beings to grab more than is needed, just in case the good times stop rolling. I believe it is time to revive the feeling that small is beautiful… and what better nation to export this self-sustaining virtue than Japan?

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You Are A Friend, Teacher or Whatever Until…

September 29th, 2011

“True goodbyes are the ones never said or explained.”  ~ Anon~

Japanese people can be be extremely warm and accommodating to a stranger who becomes their sensei (teacher), or any other authority figure foisted upon them through proper channels.

You can teach them, boss them, and share feasts for years with them, but one day they decide that you are disposable and they disappear from your landscape like a thief in the night.

From their perspective, they are avoiding confrontation, explanation, and the uncomfortable feelings associated with parting ways.  To many westerners, however, this Japanese approach to difficult separations is feeble and insulting.

What you must learn the hard way if you live in Japan any length of time is that you are either in the group and protected or outside the group and easily disposed of on a whim.

Ironically and quite surprisingly, the Japanese are just as cold and calculating with their own tribe.  The myth that Japanese companies offer lifetime employment and a family-like setting has been a boldfaced lie for a long time.

Most corporations used to carry dead-wood employees until 62 or so.  Many now strip parasites (perhaps rightfully) of their titles in their mid fifties, then slightly to drastically reduce their wages, and finally offer a somewhat generous -though deceivingly not optional – early retirement buyout.

Most of those targeted quietly retire early rather than face humiliation in the workplace.  They may have significant savings, if their company is doing well, but they have lost their self-confidence to be somebody other than a lapel-pin loyalist to a corporate slave master.

The good news is that more Japanese are waking up to the painful reality that lifetime employment is a Faustian choice they needn’t make.

There are alternatives to being a blind follower of a bankrupt, outdated, unworkable system that will leave many poor and disillusioned in the years to come.

We must believe in ourselves – our skills and ability to find and exploit opportunities – without depending on a crumbling, socialized corporate structure.

That awareness in our self-worth will be the key to our survival and prosperity in the next generation.

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When Dignity is Lost

September 26th, 2011


Smoke and mirrors.  The entire Japanese miracle was just that.  For fifty-plus years of one-party rule in a democracy (of sorts), business as usual meant biting the bullet when economic trends were in a tailspin and taking a few crumbs more when indicators skyrocketed.

Even the bubble “keizai” era – when making money was as easy for some as watching stocks and real estate shoot through the roof – risk-aversive, disciplined and highly-controlled Japanese – a majority of folks here – watched from the sideline as the rich and the reckless got richer and richer.

Then, when the bubble burst a majority of these gamblers and their assets went south and the conservative, play-it-safe majority and pundits who sat out the boom sneered at these fleetingly rich bums suddenly turned poor fools with taunts of “I told you so (fool)!”

So now we have the first post-war changing of the political guard, just as unemployment figures also reach post-war highs.  By western standards, of course, the less than six percent unemployment rate seems quite enviable.

But did you know that the squeaky-clean figures for unemployment do not include people who work even one hour per week, nor women (relegated to the kitchen or PTAs for good reasons or not) and who have never participated in the work village?

Obviously the number of unemployed by overseas standards would hover at between 15 and 20 percent.  That is why so many young people choose or are forced to stay at home until their mid thirties or beyond.

More and more, you see people worried that the lifetime  system has collapsed and that the prospect for gainful employment in Japan is lessening by the breath.

The collective dignity of the Japanese is shot.  Jobs are disappearing, salaries are leveling off, and outsourcing and temp working are surging.

In other words, we are at the dawn of the entrepreneurial boom.  Sayonara to salary man drudgery.  Hello innovation.  In the worst of times, the best will arise.

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Anger, the Japanese and Me

September 16th, 2011

“There is nothing more galling to angry people than the coolness of those on whom they wish to vent their spleen.“                ~Alexandre Dumas~

Many short-fuse foreigners in Japan believe that being assertive and obnoxious – the Ugly American Syndrome – in Japan will insure action in this docile country.

In my nearly 31 years here, such rudeness and overbearing, Ugly-American manner scantly brings a positive result.

One case in my very first year in Japan should have taught me a lesson about living here, but unfortunately it didn’t.  A Japanese junior high teacher whom I worked with had an extra phone line which she was willing to transfer to me.

We went to the telephone monopoly, NTT, and I could tell by the hissing between teeth that something was awry from the start.  He explained to my benefactor that my signature would not be adequate.  “I needed a hanko (personal stamp),” he stated while pointing with smug confidence to the affirming regulation.

The 5 Essential People Skills

I left their office grumbling about red tape and whatnot, but we went to a hanko shop and found a stamp with Hoshina – though my name is Posner (poh-zu-na).

We then marched back into the office ready for the transfer of the phone, but the same bureaucratic office worker said it must be Posner in katakana.

Seething, I got defiant and said “Why can’t I sign like I do at the bank?”  He took out his regs again and espoused the technicality.  Then he said, “Please make the personal stamp in English with Richard Alan Posner carved into the stamp.  I went into a tizzy and was spitting venom at a guy who was just smiling plastically and saying, “Sumimasen” (I’m so sorry), with a long, shallow bow.

The phone was never meant to be mine, I guess.  Especially because my hostility was met with calm efficiency or indifference.  Many other similar cases have occurred in my years here, and more often than not these days I just shrug my shoulders and get over it.

My mother once taught me about anger.  She said, “If you want to say or write something mean or angry in tone to another, write it down, put it in a drawer for one full day, take it out again, decide if it would be wise to write or say to the say impulsively, and if you still harbor any doubt you should go ahead with the ordeal, put it back into the drawer for two more days.  Eventually, you will note that the anger is 99 percent of the time out of proportion to the alleged act against you because your ego reigns and needs to be right and dominate in everyday behavior.

To survive in Japan, if you are a foreigner, you must heed my mother’s advice.  If you don’t, your life or business with the Japanese will seldom come to a good end.

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On Being Pushed Into A Corner

September 15th, 2011

“When we long for life without difficulties, remind us that oaks grow strong in contrary winds and diamonds are made under pressure.”  ~Peter Marshall, TV personality~


It has been said that Japan is changing and that the tempers of the young are every bit as explosive as that of American hotheads.  The only difference between the cultures being, say the social critics, that the Japanese don’t have easy access to firearms.

Yes, there are an increasing number of senseless, violent crimes happening almost every day in this island-nation, but all in all this country remains one of the safest on the planet.

Japanese don’t take kindly to overt pressure and intimidation.  When they are in a proverbial corner, they will bow and look for a non-violent, non-confrontational escape.  Sometimes they will nervously blink and try in vain to act as if their adversary or intimidator doesn’t even exist.

If you are planning to make a frontal, guns blazing approach to doing business here, no doubt you will meet a great yet subtle resistance from the natives.

Don’t mistake silence or nervousness as a sign that you have won the battle and the war.  On the contrary, you will make virtually no progress by intimidation.  Inside themselves the Japanese may well be seething, but for you they will mask their displeasure with a somewhat courteous smile.

That perfunctory smile is usually a kiss of death in business relations.

Always give a Japanese person a clear avenue of escape.  When you do so, they will appreciate your sensitivity to their discomfort and perhaps give you another try at making a good impression.

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Why Japanese Have Been Immune To Recessions

September 13th, 2011

Who is the average Japanese?  He or she is a person who doesn’t obsess about how well others are doing in comparison to themselves.

In highly-competitive, dog-eat-dog worlds such as can be found in the United States, the delineation between winners and losers can be, and often is, stark.

While some carnivorous achievers eat prime cuts’ from the beef of life, far too many others are chasing after the elusive, rancid bone of fame and fortune.

They’ve been sold a bill of goods that only exists for most in a Hollywood screen set.

The crazy chase for riches is horrifically frustrating and futile for all but the very few with the resources and wiles to stay concentrated indefinitely on a target which keeps moving.

The Japanese are by nature much more egalitarian and much more willing to settle for less.  Almost every toy and ploy is marketed and priced in a manner which makes it possible for almost every Japanese worker to possess the creature comforts which their neighbors possess.

The most important principle that checks wild swings in economic terms is the ability of the Japanese government, industry and academic cadres to foster a false idea that all Japanese are nearly equal.  Their people bite into this concept hook, line and sinker from one generation to the next despite evidence to the contrary.

In Japan, like in America, the rich-poor gap has become a great divide.  Many people here are beginning to sense that their perceptions of “Everyone is middle class” is (and always was) a factual distortion.

Free societies welcome new ideas and entrepreneurial spirit.  Some prosper, while many others live off the trickle-down scraps of the ambitious fortune-seekers and doers.

Because this entrepreneurial age has tiptoed into Japan, many Japanese are still living in a time-warped delusion of cradle-to-grave safety through conformity to conventions.

The dawning of the age of free spirits – able and willing to risk security for the chance to excel – is at Japan’s doorstep.

Regardless of whether or not you like this paradigm shift and loss of national innocence, the opportunity exists for visionaries (foreign and Japanese) to teach and coach a new generation of unashamed achievers.

Are you positioning your business or ambitions to participate in this changing of the guard in Japan?

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Redeeming Qualities of Japanese People

September 6th, 2011

There are some things which absolutely frustrate or incense me about Japan and how their people live.  Yet this country is safe and prosperous.  Here are ten reasons why:

1)  By and large, they follow rules and regulations which can threaten life or limb.  They do, however, flaunt laws and rules that are inconvenient to them, such as smoking in prohibited zones or cutting in line without a second thought.

2)  They are neatly dressed and groomed.

3) They keep their house exteriors relatively free of litter and junk, at least when compared to many areas of the States.

4) They keep slender and relatively fit because they ride bicycles and don’t food graze in malls on weekends.

5) They have unspoken allegiance to their company, at least until recently.

6) They will spend money for perceived quality.

7) They do not have fist fights or Uzi-ridden gang wars.  Safety is the ultimate attractor factor for many foreigners coming from crime-ridden societies.

8) They are very time-conscious, with the train system as a model for the world of efficiency and safety.

9) They do not let religion or religious beliefs rule their every thought or foster intolerance.

10) The education system – while not fostering originality and innovation – does its job of teaching the fundamentals necessary for a functional life.

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The Future of Immigration in Japan

August 27th, 2011

Japanese rabbit-hutch houses and the people that occupy them have seen their day.  People live in more spacious accommodations now and few, if any families, live and sleep in one room or lack the creature comforts of life.  By and large, life is good on Japanese Maple Drive.

But there is a storm cloud on the horizon.  Where have all the children gone.  Gone to iPods and PlayStations everyone.

After all, wouldn’t one rather have a sexually-liberated, dumbed-down society of childless adults spending all their booty on narcissistic doodads and toys?

The drudgery of making babies and draining adult-age pocketbooks on diapers and parenthood incidentals is not a scintilla as alluring to most as the newest  Final Fantasy or Virtua GFighter 4: Evolution.

So Japan depopulates and the only way to maintain the infrastructure is to tax and spend.  And when the spending far exceeds the tax base due to a dwindling population, a society such as Japan has only a few stark choices:

*Let a few big corporations survive and a wave of hollowing out, overseas outsourcing ensue.  This will lead to blighted lives here and a Third World infrastructure down the road (with no pun intended).

*Revamp an industrial society which discourages and seldom provides low-cost childcare services for two-working-parent families.

*Or…let the floodgates of immigration be opened wide.

I chose the third because Japan’s fifteen minutes of fame in history will surely pass in the next thirty years if it doesn’t openly welcome foreigners to live and work as equals in this hermetically-sealed society.

The xenophobic, us vs them policy of the Japanese government is widely believed by the Japanese to be justified.  “We Japanese like to eat rice,” is more than a statement of fact; it is a subtle way of saying:

“United we stand, divided we fall.”

Nothing, in my humble estimation, could be further from the truth.  Insularity and island xenophobia will relegate the Japanese nation to a once was great society in the history books.

Undoubtedly, this new toleration of foreigners cannot and will not happen with the flick of a magic wand.  There are language and customary barriers which will cause a painful adjustment for insiders and outsiders alike.  But this huge change is an inevitable.

If you are a foreigner living and working here or wanting to do so, then you do have rights.  Although you may not gain seniority in some positions, in some you can.  Although you may not vote in most areas in Japan, in some you can.  Although certain lines of business are off-limits to foreigners, others such as car exporting and language school operations are available with few restraints.

Japan needs us, whether they realize it or not.  United we stand, but divided we fall.

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Unashamed Youth With Fistfuls’ Of Moolah

August 15th, 2011

The number of single households in Japan has surpassed for the first time the number of married couple households.  More and more women are opting to remain single longer or forever.

What once was a man’s domain, the “wise” investing of family earnings has now seen a larger number of women – presumably single – looking to financial markets where they can get a higher rate of return than the low-interest accounts of banks.  My wife is the married equivalent.

There is a growing demand for websites and seminars for individuals with little or no experience in investing.  I personally know of one woman who has made more than 2 million yen in the last six months on gold and silver markets.

It is my firm belief that education about money shouldn’t begin after you start working.  It should start from the age when a child understands that the ice cream mommy bought cost money.  Parents are the first line of defense against fiscal irresponsibility as adults.  Jim Rohn, a renowned business coach and public speaker, says that the goal of every parent and educator should be to give a child the fiscal and moral training to allow the child by the tender age of eighteen to be independently wealthy.

Thus, the opportunity lies in teaching young Japanese children through manga step-by-step training booklets for elementary-age school children and online training for middle and senior high school students in the art of becoming financially independent.  This could also build up a strong mailing list which will then buy your proprietary software for researching and investing worldwide once they graduate from high school.

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