Episode #468: The Difference Between Western and Japanese Meetings

Internal meetings are held for worthy purposes such as reporting, planning and innovating. Not everyone views these meetings the same way though and this is where we can face problems when we run meetings in Japan.

Let’s examine 8 sets of typical meeting issues we will be familiar with:

Expressions of desire. The range here runs from one group, who express their desires as a wish, all the way to the other end of the scale, where actual demands are being made. We may prefer that those who are wishing for outcomes were more assertive and just come out and ask for what they want. On the other hand, we may feel confronted by aggressive team members who start making demands on us during the meeting.

Winning at all costs or cooperating. Hard driving people get things done, they brook no interference and apply their energy, guile to bulldoze their way through the barriers. They have tunnel vision, only see their interests and are oblivious to their impact on those around them. Those at the opposite end of the scale are sensitive to the others in the meeting and are busily kuki wo yomu – reading the air in the room, in order not to offend anyone. The middle group stand up to the bulldozers and put forward their own views, willing to engage in open debate.

Stress under fire. Business is highly stressful in this modern age, as technology and speed of change keeps the challenges coming thick and fast. Some of the team will be stressed, but will be aggressive and add to the stress of others in the meeting. Another group will also be stressed, but hide it, so as the leader, we may not be picking up on it. Others will acknowledge they are stressed, deal with it internally and keep moving forward.

Varying communication styles. Confrontational, direct communication can cross the red line and become inappropriate very quickly. As the leader we would prefer an honest conversation on the issues, so that we can gauge the array of views on the subject. Quieter team members can have good points to make, but they self-censor and prefer to either say nothing or are very indirect in what they say. They often get run over by the more aggressive individuals in the room.

Deflaters and elevators. To get to the number one position, strong individuals will jockey for position. They elevate their power by depressing the power of others. I remember being in meeting where one of the sales guys was telling one of the administration staff, that she was a cost center and he was a profit center, implying his value to the organisation was greater than hers. There are others though, who are building others up and even some who do so at their own sacrifice.

Degrees of accountability. We want everyone be accountable and to hold everyone else to be accountable too. Some dominant people though want to control everything and hold others to account, but grant themselves a free pass, because they are so awesome or hardworking or a major producer.

Confront or acquiesce. Being confrontational in business is a given for some people, yet for others, it is the last thing they would ever dream of doing. They may even bend over backwards to avoid confrontation, because it is too much pressure for them to endure. We would prefer people to be passionate, but considerate and to make their point, without trying to intimidate everyone else to get agreement.

Thrusting or hiding. Being direct is fine, as long as it is done in a polite and considerate, collegiate manner. The problems arise when the communication of their position is done in a direct, even abrasive way, because they don’t care what others think. The other problem is when feelings are being hidden and valid concerns and views not being expressed, robbing the meeting of different perspectives.

For Western leaders all of these types of meeting issues would be very familiar and we grow up in business trying to find ways of dealing with them. We accumulate a tool box to deal with them. We go to leadership courses which give us ideas on solutions. What happens though, when we start running meetings in Japan in the same way?

The Japanese approach to meetings is to use them as one stage in moving the business forward. There is a lot of wisdom in this idea, because what happens before and after the meeting play important roles. In the West, we tend to get in the meeting room and duke it out, until we make some decisions and then everyone gets back to their job. In Japan, the meeting room itself is not the gladiatorial venue it is in the West and almost all of the issues considered so far, are subsumed by a different take on how to use meetings to get results. So where is the toolbox for these occasions?

Nemawashi or groundwork files down the rough edges of disagreement before the meeting starts. Loud people, quiet people - everyone is consulted prior to the meeting and the lobbying is started, so that the meeting itself is a rubber stamp on decisions already agreed to prior to the meeting proper. Any disagreements are worked on privately, so that the meetings can be run with efficiency and decorum.

If we come to meetings with a purely Western view, we will be expecting these flagged eight issues in full flight, which all work perfectly well in our home environments, but we may not find what we are looking for. If we use the nemawashi methodology, we can circumvent many of these problems.