AM Lecture 1

Downsides to Japanese management

There are a few questions and observations that need to be considered on the topic of Japanese management in relation to why it didn't work too well in Western firms.

Is productivity improvement the result of cost-cutting?

The decision-making process seems to impede creativity, rather than encourage it

Once performance improvement techniques are made public, all companies can adopt them, including Western firms. However, Japanese business culture is not transferable to Western organisations. One of the reasons for this is that workers in Western companies are very reluctant to adopt a Japanese way of thinking. This suggests that Japanese management needs to be adapted to suit Western tastes.

Dark side of Japanese management in the 1990s

Potential Reasons

The great management myth?

The China syndrome?