By James Santagata
Principal Consultant, SiliconEdge


That Japan like any country, be it developing or developed, has her share of problems is not in the least bit surprising or at least it shouldn't be.

However, what has surprised me over the years is how many foreign "Japan watchers" and "Japan pundits" always seem to miss the crux of what's really going on on the ground in Japan and more importantly what's going on in the mind of the Japanese.

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With that said,  there is another popular myth and meme that comes up regarding the lack of Japanese startups and that is the idea that the Japanese have an almost in-born fear of failure.

I'm not here to argue that Japanese don't have a fear of failure because they do. We all do. Just as most other peoples around the world do, including those in the US and even including those working in Silicon Valley.

People fear failure. 

But to hear the pundits tell it, "Japanese need to get over failure and embrace it". These pundits act like the fear of failure in Japan is simple a psychological construct* like it is in parts of the West like in the US.

The Sun Also Rises (陽はまた昇る), starring Ken Watanabe (Westerner's will know him from The Last Samurai and Inception) is a great movie showing Japanese Leadership & Innovation at its finest -- in this case concerning the development of the VHS tape standard and VHS Video Tape Recorder by Victor Japan (JVC).

In case you missed it, TBS ran a very good drama called Leaders which covered Toyota's founding as an automotive design and manufacturing company and their revolutionary transition from weaving looms to becoming an international automobile giant.

The DVD is coming out August, 8th.

By James Santagata
Principal Consultant, SiliconEdge


If it seems that we're under a constant barrage of the Western Media Myth (WMM) that (a) Japan is "failing" and that (b) this "failure" is primarily due to Japan's "talent problem" don't fret because we are.

Further, we are told that Japan's supposed "lack of talent" has manifested itself in such as way as to be responsible for Japan's supposed "lack of creativity" and "lack of innovation"".

But not to worry according to the WMM as we're then told that these "problems" that Japan faces can simply solved by (a) increasing the number of English-speaking Japanese and (b) internationalizing "backwards" Japanese-only speaking Japanese and (c)  increasing the number of immigrants in Japan, preferably by engaging in a sort of US-Open Bordersfashion.
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The Western Media's argument or framing of the issues, especially in terms of Japan's supposed lack of  "English-speaking" talent becomes even more silly when we consider that it ignores what I have deemed the "tip of the spear" or "tip of the sword" strategy.
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We're pleased to announce that Jun Kabigting (MBA/MS/HRMP) has joined FirstPoint Japan's Advisory Board as our resident expert on all matters related to Japanese HR.

Jun is an HRCI-certified HR Management Professional (HRMP) with more than 20 years of solid experience across the entire HR value chain of recruit, retain and release, most of them Japan-focused. He passionately believes in advancing the HR profession in Japan through continuing HR education, knowledge sharing, and use of HR best practices.

He has a solid experience as a trainer, HR consultant, and HR-focused executive search consultant. He also has experience in other HR fields like performance management, compensation & benefits design, organizational design and development, change management, as well as other HR generalist functions like employee relations, coaching, and career counseling. Jun likewise serves as legal resident Representative Director and/or External Director for other organizations as part of HRCKK's Corporate Governance services.
Jun Kabigting (MBA/MS/HRMP)

Jun holds an MBA (Major in International HR Management) from the University of Hawaii at Manoa and Japan Management Certificate from the Japan-America Institute of Management Science (JAIMS). He also holds an M.S. in Industrial Engineering (major in Production and Operations Research) from the prestigious University of the Philippines and received his Certificate in HR Studies from Cornell University’s School of Industrial Labor and Relations (ILR).

Japanese Start-Ups Channel Samurai Spirit: The Samurai Startup Island, in a low-rent office district built on a landfill on Tokyo Bay, is at the vanguard of what many hope is a new generation of innovators.

By Martin Fackler, New York Times
Published: December 25, 2013

TOKYO — The 20-somethings in jeans sipping espresso and tapping on laptops at this Tokyo business incubator would look more at home in Silicon Valley than in Japan, where for years the surest signs of success were the gray suits of its corporate salarymen. But for those hoping the nation’s latest economic plan will drag Japan from its long malaise, the young men and women here at Samurai Startup Island represent a crucial component: a revival of entrepreneurship.

The signs of that comeback are still new, and tentative enough that the statistics on start-ups and initial public offerings have not caught up. But analysts and investors report that hundreds of new Internet and technology-related companies have sprung up in the last two to three years, creating an ecosystem of incubators like Samurai Startup Island and so-called accelerator new venture investment funds, which invest in early-state start-ups in hopes of cashing in.

Some top universities — the same ones that have long defined success as a job in an established company or elite government ministry — have begun not only to create their own incubators and venture funds, but also to develop curriculums on birthing start-ups. And while some young entrepreneurs say real progress will come only if Prime Minister Shinzo Abe acts as promised to shake up Japan’s hidebound corporate culture, they say the stock market rally and broader optimism created by the economic plan known as Abenomics are already making it easier to find investors and customers.

“This is the beginning of something that could rejuvenate Japan,” said Mitsuru Izumo, the founder of Euglena Corporation, a biotechnology start-up valued at $1 billion, and one of the country’s most prominent new entrepreneurs. “If we don’t unleash our youth, then Japan will become too weak to survive another blow like Fukushima. Entrepreneurship is Japan’s last chance.”

For years, sagging entrepreneurial spirit has been cited as a major reason for Japan’s inability to save itself from a devastating deflationary spiral. The nation that produced Sony, Toyota and Honda has created few successors.

By James Santagata
Principal Consultant, SiliconEdge

Richard Solomon of Beacon Reports recently wrote a very thoughtful piece first questioning and then analyzing the ability of Japanese firms to complete globally (see: Can Japanese Firms Compete In Global Markets?)

I. Myths & Memes
As so often happens with this and many other topics, ranging from war to innovation to relationships and dating, the question itself is beset if not hobbled with a series of Myths and Memes which we'll explore and unravel together in a series of future articles. 

II. Are Japanese Baseball Players Good Enough For Major League Baseball?
My first thought upon reading this article was simply how it parallels this modern reality: Are Japanese baseball players good enough for major league baseball?

Think about it.  We used to ask this very same question about Japanese baseball players. Could Japanese baseball players make it in the major leagues?  Sure, we all knew that the Japanese players were solid players, they were good, no one disputed that but we wanted to know could the Japanese baseball players really make it in the major leagues? (see: The New Age Of Japanese Baseball-Player Media Coverage Sam Robinson May 9, 2008)

III. Can Japan Compete Globally On A Military Basis?
From historical records we know that the Japanese can compete globally, industrially, cultural and, yes, even militarily. So let's start with the military perspective. Militarily, the fierce fighting tactics and spirits of Japanese soldiers during WWII lead to horrific allied battle casualties, both physical and psychological (see: Thousand Yard Stare), that in many cases easily outstripped what was encountered in the European theater (although there are obviously some exceptions). And, of course, some of the fiercest battles of WWII were held in the Pacific theater: Tarawa. Saipan. Midway. Coral Sea. Marshall Islands, Eniwetok. Guadalcanal. Iwo Jima, and, of course,Okinawa all come to mind along with the horrific casualties and loss of life among both soldiers and civilians.

A big thanks goes out to Roukan.com as Roukan.com's Work Environment Surveys Solution Is Now An Official Sponsor of FirstPoint Japan.

Japan aims to return to Walkman glory days
STUART BRAUN

In an effort to climb back to its Walkman glory days, Japan is investing heavily in R&D, especially in its technology strongholds. But the culture may not have the same appetite for risk as its competitors and may be outpaced by more aggressive countries, experts say.

When Japan exclusively developed and manufactured Walkmans, Honda hatchbacks and Nintendos, it was set to overtake the United States as the world’s largest economy. Today, Japan continues to be a world-leading high-tech innovator. Yet in commercial terms, the competition has caught up, and is often running ahead. As the Apples and Samsungs of the world outcompete Sony and Panasonic, Japanese companies are trying to revive the country’s economic miracle.


Others argue that Japan’s declining competitiveness is less a lack of innovation than of leadership. “Innovation by itself, though mesmerizing, is worthless without productization. And productization is worthless without monetization,” says James Santagata, managing director of SiliconEdge, a Tokyo-based leadership development consultancy working with startups in Japan and the United States.

Mr. Santagata describes a number of pioneering innovations emerging from Japanese corporate R&D, such as Sony’s Location Free TV. “Yet due to corporate constraints on monetization of these innovations for fear of rocking the boat, or cannibalizing some products, they allow scrappy firms like Sling Media [U.S. producer of the Slingbox Internet TV interface] to come from behind that gobble up the market,” he says.

The Global & Mail (Stuart Braun):
Japan ranked first worldwide in ‘Capacity for innovation’ on the World Economic Forum’s 2012 Global Competitiveness Report, and second in terms of Company Spending on R&D. Is this reflected in real ongoing innovation in Japan?    

According to the "Global Innovation Barometer" survey by General Electric Co. released in March, Japan's self-assessments were the lowest among the surveyed countries. Does this surprise you in light of the WEF competitiveness report? What is causing the dissonance in these views of Japanese competitiveness and innovation?

SiliconEdge (James Santagata):
For decades Japan has been churning out innovation after innovation, some of which are both very visible and "sexy", such as today's automobiles or when Japan dominated the video entertainment and portable audio player market. Many other innovations, such as those by Toray composites, are critical albeit invisible as they are industrially rather than  consumer focused. Nevertheless, this innovation continues today.

Paradoxically, while rest of the world recognizes Japanese prowess in regards to innovation, the Japanese themselves are much less impressed by their innovations. Partly this can be explained by Japanese tendencies towards humility and introspection. Beyond this, however, much more can be attributed to the perceived (from the Japanese perspective) if not actual lack of visible let alone "sexy" innovations, primarily in the consumer space.