The Sound of One Hand Slapping.

 The Sakuranomiya High School basketball captain chose death rather than face another demeaning day of 30 face slaps from his Coach Hajime Komura. The coach “got results” so his coaching methods were accepted for 18 years at that school. Osaka police have handed Komura’s case over to the Public Prosecutors urging indictment.

 Japanese Olympic Judo Coach Ryuji Sonoda was described as a “sadist” in the Japan Olympic Committee’s investigation of Judo coach violence. This came to light only after the protest of elite female Olympic athletes complaining about his violent methods of instruction, “our dignity as humans was disgraced”.

 Elements of the Japanese media supported Sonoda’s “tough love” methods, noting his charges did better than the Judo men at the London Olympics. The Weekly Playboy helpfully pointing out that “female athletes are difficult to work with”. Sports Minister Shimomura on the other hand described the situation as the "most serious in Japan's sports history".

 This culture of harassment, based on position power, is not limited to the sports world. The first time I saw it in the workplace I was amazed. In the 1980s, I was working as a coordinator for a visiting Japanese film crew shooting a series of ads in Queensland. The still cameraman’s second assistant fumbled and dropped a completed film roll on to the sand of Surfer’s Paradise Beach. In a split second, the diminutive mustachioed Ad Director strode across, reached up and whacked the 110 kilo assistant hard across the face. Wow!

 Perspective is important. Physical violence like this in the workplace is not the biggest problem leaders face in Japan. These cases are probably statistically insignificant. The more widespread problem is the deep seated attitude of Japanese managers to performance enhancement.

 Drill sergeants were sent into the school system from the 1920s to toughen up the younger generation so they could become cannon fodder for the Empire. Officer violence towards new conscripts, entering the Imperial forces from the late 1930s, was designed to mould youth for death or glory. Japan, like everywhere else, relied on its de-mobbed officer corps to provide postwar corporate leadership.

 The Japanese school system has continued the “tough love” approach for producing excellence, and so it is with industry, minus the face slapping.

 Most Western captains of industry worked out long ago that peak performance could be better attained with praise and encouragement, rather than criticism, condemnation and complaint. Many in Japan missed that email. Management mindsets in Japan are more firmly fixed on a “no mistake” culture. This is great from a diligence, discipline, and reliability viewpoint. The downside is what happens when mistakes do happen. The result is rarely a “teachable moment”, more a sharp reminder of who is the boss and who is “stupid”. The contradiction of asking for creativity, for new ideas and methods and then rapidly jumping on any errors, reveals staggeringly diminished self-awareness.

 Growing up here, experiencing how performance is “enhanced” in the school club environment and then more of the same at University, takes Japanese workers and managers to a different place from their foreign bosses. To create a counterpoint to these “tough love” practices requires an understanding that this phenomenon exists in the first place.

 You probably learnt about the Osaka basketball captain and about the elite female Judo athletes in the English media here. For foreigners, it is not a natural mental leap to connect these occurrences to your own organization. You may never see it or hear about it, because the system filters you out of the loop, punishes whistle blowers and sweeps “shameful” occurrences under the tatami.

 Rather, presume there is a culture of criticism that needs to be replaced with praise and encouragement. Presume that the managers need guidance about handling mistakes, so the end result is enabling a culture of creativity, growth and therefore differentiated advantage over rivals. Presume that “tough love” will have been the default OJT (On the Job Training) instructional methodology of many of your managers, especially those schooled in the 1950s, 1960s and 1970s. Presume that manager criticism is driving your young, talented, expensive fourth year new entrants into the arms of your rivals, as they vote with their feet and depart. Presume the system of itself, won’t suggest you need to do anything about any of this.

 Might be time to consider aligning ancient Japan pedagogy with modern best practice.

 If you enjoy these articles, then head over to www.japan.dalecarnegie.com and check out our "Free Stuff" offerings - whitepapers, guidebooks, training videos, podcasts, blogs. Take a look at our Japanese and English seminars, workshops, course information and schedules.