Thank you, Todd. Good afternoon! I am delighted to be here in Spokane today during Japan Week 2009. I would like to thank Whitworth University for being such gracious hosts.
It is a special privilege to be able to share my thoughts with you on service quality in Japan, having lived and worked there off and on over the last 30 years.
Lead-in: I would like to begin by asking a question. I suspect it is fair to say that many of you here today have some experience with Japan. How many of you...
...how many of you have had or expect to have a project that has something to do with Japan?
Good, I hope we get a chance to listen to some of your examples at the end of the session.
Lead-in: I think you will find, if you haven’t already, that doing a project with Japan is...[quite a challenge]...
...quite a challenge, because of the special requirements from colleagues and customers in Japan who expect a different level of quality in goods or services than we may be used to.
Lead-in: I also think you will find at some point in your projects for Japan that at some point you will also face challenges from a...[skeptic ]
...skeptic here in the US who will challenge you to explain just why it is that you need to deliver something extra, or a special level of quality for your Japan project.
One of my objectives today is to share some ideas to help you deal with this character and his questions, using historical, cultural, and personal examples from living and working in Japan.
Lead-in: To get things started, I would like to suggest that we not think of...[quality as luxury]...
...not think of quality as luxury...
Lead-in: But instead, think of it...[as necessity]...
...quality as necessity, instead. We will come back to this point a bit later.
Lead-in: In order to set some context to this discussion of the importance of quality in Japan and how it is different from the US, I would like to provide a ...[brief history of quality]...
...brief (and very selective) history of Japan and American business quality and associated impressions between roughly the 1950s and the early 1990s, with apologies to any historians in the audience.
If you talk to anyone who lived through the 1950’s and asked them what came to mind in those days when they saw the words...[“made in Japan”]...
...brief (and very selective) history of Japan and American business quality and associated impressions between roughly the 1950s and the early 1990s, with apologies to any historians in the audience.
If you talk to anyone who lived through the 1950’s and asked them what came to mind in those days when they saw the words...[“made in Japan”]...
...“made in Japan” in those days, I suspect they would tell you it was the image of cheap, low quality toys.
Lead-in: Japan did not stop there, of course, and began a truly remarkable post-war transformation of the economy. One of the interesting elements of the history of quality between Japan and the US is that Japan effectively was fortunate to have two eminent...[imported gurus]...
...W. Edwards Deming and Joseph M. Duran were both invited by the Japan Union of Scientists and Engineers (JUSE) in the early 1950s to help engineers and top management at leading Japanese companies improve quality. These two quality gurus played a significant role in establishing both process and management quality in Japan.
Lead-in: Surprisingly, the...[1st Japanese car sold in US}...
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Background Notes:
W. Edwards Deming (1900-1993): Statistical process control, Systematic approach to problem solving--”plan, do, check”,;came to Japan in 1947 to help plan for Japan’s 1951 census.
Joseph M. Juran (1904-2008): Managing for quality, quality planning, quality improvement, quality control; came to Japan in 1954
...W. Edwards Deming and Joseph M. Duran were both invited by the Japan Union of Scientists and Engineers (JUSE) in the early 1950s to help engineers and top management at leading Japanese companies improve quality. These two quality gurus played a significant role in establishing both process and management quality in Japan.
Lead-in: Surprisingly, the...[1st Japanese car sold in US}...
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Background Notes:
W. Edwards Deming (1900-1993): Statistical process control, Systematic approach to problem solving--”plan, do, check”,;came to Japan in 1947 to help plan for Japan’s 1951 census.
Joseph M. Juran (1904-2008): Managing for quality, quality planning, quality improvement, quality control; came to Japan in 1954
...W. Edwards Deming and Joseph M. Duran were both invited by the Japan Union of Scientists and Engineers (JUSE) in the early 1950s to help engineers and top management at leading Japanese companies improve quality. These two quality gurus played a significant role in establishing both process and management quality in Japan.
Lead-in: Surprisingly, the...[1st Japanese car sold in US}...
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Background Notes:
W. Edwards Deming (1900-1993): Statistical process control, Systematic approach to problem solving--”plan, do, check”,;came to Japan in 1947 to help plan for Japan’s 1951 census.
Joseph M. Juran (1904-2008): Managing for quality, quality planning, quality improvement, quality control; came to Japan in 1954
...was in 1956 or 1957 (a Toyota, I believe). There are a few more points to note on this topic, from a quality perspective, a bit later. The world’s first transistor radio was first produced two years earlier in Japan, by a predecessor to Sony (TTK).
Lead-in: The huge economic growth began around 1960. Fast forwarding to 1964...[Tokyo Olympics & bullet train]...
...when Japan introduced the very sophisticated bullet train in the same year that Tokyo played host to the Olympic Games, clearly demonstrating Japan’s reemergence as a technically advanced country on the world’s stage.
Lead-in: By the late 1970s, we here in the US were beginning to see Japan as being nearly invincible in the business world, as symbolized by the title of the book written by Harvard’s Ezra Vogel...[“Japan as No. 1”]...
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Current Background: Tokyo is bidding to be the host city for the 2016 Summer Olympics--the selection will be made in October. One of its close rivals is Chicago, with President Obama’s enthusiastic support.
“Japan as No. 1”. Vogel highlighted the superior level of basic education, low crime, wise and powerful bureaucracy, and the well-functioning democracy as being reasons for Japan’s dominance. (source: “Sisyphus, the Japan specialist”, Paul J. Scalise, JapanReview.net, 2001)
I still remember being on a subway in Tokyo in 1980 shortly after reading this book, and was disillusioned to see well-dressed Japanese business men reading comic books rather than serious business books. I have since come to have a more nuanced view of the role of comic books in Japan, but that is a topic for another talk.
Lead-in: We seemed to finally begin to take the quality gap with Japan seriously by the early 1980s, and, in effect...[re-imported quality]...
...re-imported quality. In 1980, the quality guru Deming was in the US appearing in an NBC documentary entitled “If Japan Can...Why Can’t We?”, and in 1981 he worked with senior leaders at Ford Motors, emphasizing the role of management in getting their business back on track.
Lead-in: Another influential book on the quality gap with Japan was published in 1986, this time by David Halberstam...[The Reckoning”]...
...entitled “The Reckoning”, detailing the the history of the differences between how Nissan and Ford ran their respective auto manufacturing businesses and arguing that US management had got it seriously wrong. Ironically, by that time, the quality gaps had begun to narrow a bit, at least at Ford, which credited Deming’s influence in building a quality culture.
The quality movement in the US seemed to peak by the early ‘90s with fairly widespread total quality movement programs (TQM) at many businesses.
Lead-in: The direction shifted fairly dramatically in 1993, however, with the publication of Michael Hammer & James Champy’s book...[“Reengineering The Corporation”]...
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Recent Events Note: Now, 23 years later, with the firing of the GM CEO, Rick Wagoner, the NY Time columnist Maureen Dowd noted that “...the reckoning is at last here.”
...“Reengineering The Corporation”, which urged radical change or redesign of a company’s processes, organization, and culture to achieve a quantum leap in performance” (Amazon.com description). Unfortunately, it has sometimes been misunderstood and used to justify drastic cost cutting and staff reductions.
It has become very common to see “reengineering” announcements of stunning size on both sides of the Pacific Ocean since the mid-1990s, unfortunately.
Now that we have a little historical background of quality in mind (and given the historians in the audience a serious case of indigestion), I would like to share my more personal observations on the service quality aspects of living and working in Japan.
I moved to Tokyo to live and work in August of 1980 and was immediately struck with the tremendous...[urban density]...
...and was immediately struck by the tremendous urban density with a bewildering variety of architectural styles jammed together into a sprawling metropolis.
Lead-in: The second thing that struck me was the staggering...[people density]...
... staggering people density, all in a very fast-paced, exciting environment.
Surprisingly, however, I visited Tokyo before ever going to New York City, and I actually felt more culture shock in New York, than I ever have in Tokyo. Perhaps that has something to do with coming from the Pacific Northwest.
Lead-in: From a service quality perspective, one of the first things many visitors and new residents notice from is the...[shopping experience]...
...shopping experience makes it hard to enjoy shopping anywhere else.
You can find just about anything that you could possibly want to buy in Tokyo, particularly in specialty stores (e.g., stationery, do-it-yourself, camera and electronics, etc.), and the sales assistants are actually helpful and knowledgeable about the goods they are selling.
When you take your purchase to the counter, it is carefully and elegantly wrapped and sincerely presented to you (very different from the experiences we have had in New York City).
Lead-in: Eating out in restaurants in Tokyo is also a special treat...[Eating: freshness and waiters]
...with the two most striking things being the freshness of the food and the discretion of the waiters, unlike the rather annoying manner of waiters and waitresses who ask you every five minutes how things are here in the US.
In general the average quality level of all types of food in Japan is highest I have ever experienced.
Lead-in: Office life in Japan was quite an experience...[I worked in Japan for 15 years]
...I worked for a total of 15 years in Tokyo, all with American Express, focusing on card operations and customer service. People are very serious about work in Japan and leaving the office before 6 or 7 PM or fully-using your vacation days is not the norm. Although that seems to be changing with the younger generations, especially now that fully one-third of all employees in Japan are temps or contract workers (as opposed to full-time employees).
Lead-in: One of the most important things I learned from my working experience there is that Japan has a fundamentally different view of service quality...
...fundamentally different view of what it means to provide good service compared to people in other countries, particularly the US. I think that differences in culture have a significant role, something we will talk a bit more about in a few moments.
Lead-in: Let’s first consider an expression that we have probably all heard...[the customer is king]
The customer is king.
Lead-in: The comparable concept in Japan has a different twist that begins to help us understand just how different the approach to service quality really is in Japan...[the customer is God]...
This puts a wholly different meaning to the relationship between the service provider and the customer. In the US, you could argue that the view is one of feeling compelled by a king who demands service (and just might sue you if he doesn’t get his way), whereas in Japan service providers much more willingly provide service to relatively benevolent gods.
While I don’t want to push this comparison of these analogies too far, I do think there are some interesting cultural foundations in Japan that help understand this difference.
Lead-in: Here, I am thinking of the concept of...[ “concern for others”...}
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Background Note: The phrase “The customer is God” was popularized by the enka singer Haruo Minami (incidentally, one of his hit songs was the the theme song for the 1964 Tokyo Olympics) Wikipedia.
...”concern for others” or omoiyari in Japanese. This idea captures the concept of paying attention to what other people are thinking and their point of view. This is very different from the “me first” mentality that is all too common here in the US.
Lead-in: I would now like to introduce the first of two TQM (total quality management) concepts from Japan that are relevant in applying this cultural foundation to the world of business. The concept, in Japanese is...[atarimae hinshitsu]
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Background Note: I have even seen a presentation entitled “Omoiyari-Driven Development” for computer programmers using this concept of paying attention to what other people are thinking about.
atarimae hinshitsu or functional quality--the idea that a provide or service should provide the basic function that it is supposed to. Thus a pen should write or a hotel should have a bed.
Lead-in: This basic quality concept is taken very literally in Japan, much more so than in other countries. I would like to share some examples...[details]
Customers in Japan pay attention to the smallest details. We often found that we would receive feedback in Japan about things like the sealing of the corners of the flap on an envelope, or the quality of the print on a statement, or scratches on the plastic--things that customers in other countries didn’t even mention on the regular regional conference calls that I would join with colleagues around the rest of Asia.
Lead-in: The 2nd TQM concept that I would like to introduce is...[miryokutekina hinshitsu]
...miryokutekina hinshitsu or “aesthetic quality”. Now the pen that we spoke of a moment ago should be pleasing to look at, to hold and write with.
Lead-in: “Aesthetic service quality” in my experience of living and working in Japan, involves face to face or telephone interactions with customers...[concierge]
...providing telephone and lifestyle or concierge services in Japan involves service as fine art.
Talking to customers on the telephone in Japan is particularly demanding, and requires truly special skill, given the cultural expectations for formal politeness. I found this to be true across a wide-range of businesses (e.g., banking, hotels, restaurants, travel companies, department stores, etc., etc.,).
To serve American Express Card customers in Japan we devoted considerable attention to training, coaching, and monitoring call center staff, and for our most exclusive card products, we selected from the most experienced, high performing telephone reps, and provided them additional training, including visits to fine dining restaurants, talks by hotel concierges, and role-play sessions to identify creative ways to meet customer needs.
In my personal experience as a customer in Japan, I still remember arriving by taxi at the Apple Store in Ginza a few years ago with a very heavy desktop computer to be checked, and having the female staff rush out to curbside to help carry it inside. That is the kind of service that keeps people coming back. A wonderful example of an American company that “gets it right” when it comes to both product and service quality in Japan.
Lead-in: In the world of globalization and outsourcing, it is vitally important to take extra steps to ensure that everyone in the service chain truly understands what is required to meet service quality expectations in Japan...[Educate Others]...
Again, drawing on my own experience, one approach that seemed to work well was to take the time to educate others, especially people serving Japan from overseas, whether they are technical people or service people on just what is expected in Japan. And then to be sure to thank them when they meet or exceed these expectations.
In one example, I personally made video interviews of people working in a back office operation in Sydney, and asked them to describe why getting their job right was important to both colleagues and customers.
Lead-in: I hope this brief overview has given you some ideas for explaining why service quality is so important in Japan...[are you ready?]...
...and that you are closer to being ready to...
Lead-in: deal with that irritating skeptic we met at the outset...[skeptic]
...who will be peering down at you through his glasses, demanding that you explain just why it is that a special level of quality is needed for your project in Japan.
Lead-in: Remember, I urge you to think of this special level of quality... [not as a luxury]...
...not as a luxury...
Lead-in: but instead...[as a necessity]...
...not as a luxury...
Lead-in: but instead...[as a necessity]...
...as a necessity.
Lead-in: And in the current economic environment, it just might be that...[quality is survival]...
...as a necessity.
Lead-in: And in the current economic environment, it just might be that...[quality is survival]...
...quality is survival...
Lead-in: And in closing, I would like to call your attention to a thought provoking quotation from one of the two American quality gurus who was in Japan in the 1950s, W. Edwards Deming...[“survival is optional”]
...who observed that “survival is optional”.
[Note: This is last presentation slide; Next slide is black, followed by “Audience Examples & Questions”]
...who observed that “survival is optional”.
[Note: This is last presentation slide; Next slide is black, followed by “Audience Examples & Questions”]
Lead-in: I would be delighted to hear some examples of doing projects with Japan, and to answer your questions...
Who has an example from a project they have done with or for Japan to share?
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