This is a fascinating exploration of not only Japan’s business culture but, in turn, the business culture of the United States, as well. The authors give countless examples and stories to help solidify their points. There use of statistical evidence and even charts and graphs also help the reader digest the rich content. Japan's Business Renaissance is easy to read, even for non-business executives, yet so full of information and proof that the reader never needs to doubt the claims the authors make. ... Just released, Japan's Business Renaissance is very timely and up-to-date, but with information which will certainly be valuable for years to come.
Healthy domestic demand cycle was missing during Japan's long economic doldrums, which began with the collapse of bubbles in the land and stock markets in the early 1990s. "The uncompetitive parts of the Japanese economy are becoming more and more competitive," said Mark Fuller, co-author of the book "Japan's Business Renaissance." "So the average of the entire economy should show some real growth."
“Another Japan surge confirms new vigor”
Martin Fackler, The New York Times
''In terms of its ability to reinvent itself, I think Japan is the world's greatest economy," said Mark B. Fuller, co-founder and chief executive of the Monitor Group, a Cambridge consulting firm, and author, with John C. Beck, of a new book on Japan's latest makeover. Their book, ''Japan's Business Renaissance," is scheduled to be released this month by McGraw Hill.
Fuller and Beck, president of corporate training firm North Star Leadership Group in Phoenix, place Japan's newest chapter in a cultural and historic context. While many Westerners view business cycles as rise-and-fall sagas, the Samurai spirit influential in Japan emphasizes renewal and regeneration. ''One country, Japan, has consistently reinvented itself for centuries now, overcoming challenges that seemed obviously fatal," they write. ''Companies, executives, and employees there have absorbed those cultural lessons and made them work in business, again and again, for longer than any of us have been alive."
Fuller, whose father was part of the US occupation of Japan after World War II, sees the nation's new breed of entrepreneurs as the latest incarnation of ronin, the samurai in feudal Japan who lost their lords and were forced to fend for themselves. Such samurai without masters, ignoring the rules, have played a key role in Japanese history.
''By any measure, the Japanese entrepreneurial society is really growing," Fuller said in an interview last week. ''There's an entire generation of Japanese who don't want to work for the large companies, who don't want to be the salarymen like their parents." Others aim to infuse new ideas and energy into established companies from within.
Fuller and Beck think Japan's revival is sustainable, and see its entrepreneurial flavor as holding lessons for US business.
''The thing we're trying to encourage is the tolerance of the ronins within companies, the tolerance of outliers," Fuller said. ''That is where you're going to get renewal."
Under the radar, Japan reinvents itself
Robert Weisman, The Boston Globe
The changes are rewriting the rules of Japan's business culture, where for decades after World War II companies marched in lock step to advance the nation's economy. That collectivist system broke down when Japan's economy stalled and even contracted in the 1990's after the collapse of twin bubbles in the real estate and stock markets.
"It's a new era for Japanese business," said John C. Beck, president of the business consulting company North Star Leadership and co-author of "Japan's Business Renaissance." "Japan has become much more entrepreneurial and innovative. Companies are taking new risks, going into new areas, making new products."
A Gamble on LCD TV's Meant Survival for Sharp
Martin Fackler, The New York Times
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Beck and his co-author Mark Fuller argue that a corporate turnaround comparable with the post World War II period and the late 1800s Meiji Restoration is already under way.
Their book, Japan's Business Renaissance: How the World's Greatest Economy Revived, Renewed, and Reinvented Itself, argues that renewal is ingrained in the more circular culture found in Japan (and China), whereas Western culture is more linear.
As a result, Japanese society and its companies are more able to remake themselves, whereas Western societies and companies are more likely to go through a single cycle of rising and falling.
"It is clear that Western companies, even Western individuals, can learn the resilient approach that seems to come naturally in Japan. It is not Japan itself, but the core of the Japanese method of rebirth and renewal that counts," they write.
The book is built on a survey of Japanese and American business people, which the authors say revealed attitudes about preparedness to embrace change which are quite at odds with the conventional wisdom of entrepreneurial America and hidebound Japan.
For example, 61 per cent of Japanese said they would like to launch an entrepreneurial business compared with 48 per cent of Americans. And 61 per cent of Japanese consider themselves team players compared with 94 per cent of Americans.
"There is something going on in Japan with the culture that most people (outside the country) don't recognise. This is the beginning of a new cycle in Japan," says Beck.
He says most foreign business people don't appreciate that Japan dumped lifetime employment 10 years ago and has been quietly infiltrating global business culture through products such as video games.
While he is reluctant to predict where the next cycle will take Japan, he says electronic culture and an economic intermediary role between China and the West are possible elements.
“Japan's sun poised to rise again”
Greg Earl, Australian Financial Review
[Beck] says that a 'new cycle of creativity' is being unleashed in Japan, one that will translate into a 'new Japanese business model' that could startle the world again in the way that Japan did in the 1980s. Something interesting is happening in corporate Japan which does not lend itself to ready explanation and which deserves a good deal more analysis than it seems to have received so far.
Japan, he asserts, is currently on the ascendant again - only no one has noticed, because their gaze is diverted elsewhere. Specifically, a new class of entrepreneurs is emerging in Japan - people who think independently, pay far less attention to 'loyalty' than was the case in the past and who are also hungry for personal reward. They are a new 'ronin' class, akin to the 'masterless samurai' of the Tokugawa era in Japan's history - a class of people who owed loyalty only to themselves.
Everyone gets excited over the management revolution that Carlos Ghosn from Renault has brought about at Nissan. But very few are even aware that equally remarkable things have been happening at Toyota, which remains firmly in Japanese management hands. Equally, few notice that Toray textile group has greatly outpaced foreign rivals. Or that Shinsei Bank, admittedly in foreign ownership now, has easily outdone the likes of Citibank in profit growth. Perhaps this is because too many people are rooted in the concept of a stagnant Japan to notice what is going on.
"Japan deserves closer look"
Anthony Rowley, The Business Times Singapore
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