Rethinking Management: New Ideas from Traditional Japan
“The purpose of business is to create and keep a customer,” said Peter Drucker. The iconic business philosopher believed in putting people before commodities. That’s not to say that Drucker wasn’t interested in profits, but rather that he believed in studying human behavior and relationships to determine the best course of action for a business.
In Drucker’s view, a business is a social organization with a responsibility toward society. A corporation should find solutions for problems and generally increase people’s happiness, through a mutually beneficial relationship.
Drucker’s ideas sound great to just about anyone, right? Yet consider the common maxim that a business must only care about profits. People often say that shareholders are the only people to whom a corporation must be accountable.
Of course, the bottom line can dictate whether a company stays around in the long run. However, we’re feeling the need for change. There’s an increasing shift toward a management model that produces what we might call a sustainable society, not merely sustainable profits.
The traditional Japanese management model
In today’s world, businesses in Japan operate more like Western corporations than ever before. The sharing of ideas has caused great change, increasing the similarities between management styles globally. However, perhaps it's time we all revisit the traditional Japanese management model to see what we can learn.
The value of a corporation, Japan’s business leaders agreed, was in its contributions to society. “Companies exist to bring happiness to the people,” the common thinking went. Over time, this thinking has become “outdated” in an increasingly profit-centered world.
When this people-centered thinking ruled Japanese management styles, businesses enjoyed a long-term, trusting relationship with their customers as well as employees and clients. Consider the fact that businesses, in essence, are made up of people. Business logic might revolve around profits, but good management requires that we consider the needs of all the people involved.
With businesses looking to the future and pondering how to adapt and innovate in the modern economy, it only makes sense to let employees be creative and provide the company with the fruits of their creativity. In fact, empowering employees allows a business to grow and thrive with change. From the mid-term to the long-term, the Japanese style of empowering employees and involving the human side of things represents a management model that we can all learn and benefit from today.
Happiness and management strategy
The happiness of the individual has been described as having four points: to be needed, to be useful, to be praised, and to be loved. Except for love, working can help a person achieve these goals for happiness. Money, or profit, cannot help someone find happiness in this sense (nor can money buy love, of course).
If a business sacrifices the human side of things while setting its sights only on profits, the people who make up that business will struggle to find happiness. The old Japanese management style cared about happiness. I think it’s safe to say that a society wishing to make any progress will need to change to create happiness as well as sustainable revenue.
The outlook for a sustainable society
In the year 2050, we’ll have a population of 9.15 billion. That means we’ll need a vastly greater amount of clean water, sufficient food, available housing, transportation, and all the products we need and enjoy from medicine to electronics and everything else. We’ll need improvements in our schools, hospitals, social infrastructure, and in our businesses.
The way the global society behaves here in the early half of the 21st century, it seems that we are not on track to take care of our fellow human beings. We face shortages and crises in our food, water, and medicine. Terrorism, warfare, and social unrest continue to plague us. To a large extent, the way our businesses manage themselves - and thus how our lives are lived and enjoyed - contributes to the escalation of these problems.
A sustainable society needs a major change from our current management trends in order to achieve quality growth. This requires leaders who understand that our future depends on us taking responsible actions on behalf of society and the earth. Our planet is a single living body, with people and an environment that need balance.
Our economic practices and corporate management system must reconsider its priorities. As it stands, management devalues nature and abandons the weak - ultimately devouring the ways of our society. I believe in enabling change that develops true leadership for corporations and organizations with a balance of profits and personal happiness.
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