The Japanese Meeting

One comment from one of the participants at our recent seminars struck me as interesting, and we'll explore it a little today. The subject was meetings, and the person (who works for a Japanese company in the US) said, "I don't understand why our Japanese bosses need to have so many meetings. We are often discussing the same subject over and over. It seems like a real waste of time, and gets in way of us being able to get our work done."

It seems what was going on was a cultural misunderstanding about the use of meetings in the workplace. It seems like sometimes even the most seemingly simple concepts, like a meeting, can have cultural connections once we look a little closely.

In the US, a meeting is a time to make announcements, discuss issues, issue assignments, and often, but not always, to make decisions or decide directions. Votes are often a part of American meetings, as well. This sounds normal, and I think most Americans would expect this overview of the purpose of meetings to be universal. The fact is, it isn't - at least not for Japan.

In Japan, a meeting is more of a place to get everyone on the same page, and to gauge the kuuki of the state of affairs. Before an important company meeting, a detailed agenda will be distributed, and departments will be given time to prepare and discuss internally before-hand. All announcements will be included, and have likely already been discussed beforehand in subcommittees and between individuals. An important thing to point out is that there will be no surprise announcements at the meeting. This is important to remember. The idea that an employee would think "I can't wait to announce we got the ABC account to the company at the meeting!" would be unheard of in Japan. Japanese business people do not like surprises, good or bad. Everyone should be equally armed with the same information before the meeting begins. This is what is needed to keep harmony.

In the meeting a discussion on a certain subject may commence, but it will likely be in the form of sharing and confirming information. The confirmation of information is a repeated process. It is here that we can really see the function of the Japanese meeting, as usually the highest ranking person or people are not active members of the discussion, or so it appears from a foreigners perspective. The highest up in the meeting is the keeper of the kuuki. The kuuki is the mood or atmosphere, and determines the direction of the meeting. If the discussion is going a direction he finds not to his liking, his body language, or a few subtle words will send a clear message that this is not the way he wants it to go. The more talkative lower-ranking participants will understand this message, and will subtly yet quickly move things in a different direction, or table the discussion until more details surface.

Most of the things that Americans do in their meeting happen outside the meeting in Japan. Voting, for instance, is done using the ringi-sho. But even then, consensus rules over opinion in Japan. The desire for harmony far outweighs the individual's need to speak his opinion, especially a dissenting one. Usually the ringi-sho is issued only when consensus is reached, so the ringi-sho is really a formality. In other words, there is no election until everyone knows that everyone is going to vote the same way. A vote to "see where everyone stands" would feel very uncomfortable in a Japanese workplace. Again, harmony, not individualism, is the path taken.

This goes back to all Japanese business persons' school days. Children in Japan are not taught to raise their hands to answer questions. The concept of the teacher asking a question openly to the class is practically unheard of. What happens more often is the teacher will call on a student to answer the question. The student, will then whisper to his neighbor asking for the answer. He will then ask the neighbor on the other side to confirm this answer. To make sure, he may whisper to one more classmate, one in front or behind, to confirm the answer again. The teacher and class waits patiently for this process to finish, and the student tells the answer to the teacher. Here's the interesting part: You can ask a Japanese high-school senior the most elemental arithmetic question, and this process will take place. Even if a student knows the answer to the question the teacher asks, it would be unharmonious to "show off" by saying the answer without including her classmates in the glory of a correct answer. Where in an American classroom hands shoot into the air when teachers ask easy questions, Japanese students would much rather never open their mouths during class time.

Back to our American employee of a Japanese company's comment about meeting after meeting for the same topics, another factor could be involved. Japanese companies are physically laid-out very different than American ones. Large companies in America are often full of cubicles. Each employee usually has at least two walls separating her from her coworkers so she can have even a little privacy and quiet to work. As a culture, Japanese value privacy much less than we do in the US (think public baths and small living quarters). See the picture of a typical looking Japanese office below.


This is the "open office" style. We see desks facing each other in double rows. At the end of the row will be one desk looking down the line. This is where the head of this group of employees sits. In this configuration, he can see and hear everything each employee is doing. This isn't done to check up on the employees or to keep them on task. It's a form of communication, and so the department head can be kept abreast of all information regarding his department as it happens. Sometimes there may be another larger desk behind him, and another higher up can watch all the employees in the room, and be kept informed of changes and events practically in real time. Kuuki plays a part in the work office. If an employee gets a disturbing phone call he can simply glance at his supervisor to tell him something is wrong. The supervisor may discreetly call the employee aside to understand the situation better, but also not embarrass him in front of his colleagues. A glance is sent up to the supervisor's supervisor, and the process is repeated.

As a Japanese supervisor, imagine working under this system, and then being sent to the US to work in a satellite office there. The promotion leads to a beautiful corner office with four walls and a nice view. This is like blindfolding a supervisor from Japan. How can he know what's going on if he can't be in the same room as his workers? He doesn't want an office with four walls (that's reserved for the company head). He can't accept just getting weekly reports from his immediate underlings. As a result, what happens is the supervisor is constantly mulling around the office, to the bother of his American workers. "Why can't he just relax and let us do our jobs?" they think, not realizing that being up to the minute, or really, up to the second on the status of things is his job. Americans often mistake this for a lack of trust, but it is really the problem of too many walls in the workplace, literally.

This may be the reason the Japanese managers call so many meetings (maybe even more than in Japan), it's to be together, without walls, and to let information and kuuki breathe freely.

Next time will talk a little more about independent thinking and working on one's own, as well as how not to put your Japanese boss on the spot.