Decoding Japanese culture

Japan, a mysterious country for Westerners

Pierre Fayard, university professor at the Institute of Business Administration at the University of Poitiers, has written numerous books and articles on strategy and Japan. He was kind enough to give us some keys to understanding to help us decode Japanese culture.

Could you give us some keys to better decode the culture of the Empire of the Rising Sun?

Very broad question. I can only give you a personal appreciation based on my daily proximity to this culture and its strategy classics.

We can deduce many of its characteristics from the physical consideration of Japan, a mountainous archipelago without depth or natural resources, and subject to unpredictable and permanent seismic vagaries. In this archipelago, the resource, essentially human, is necessarily experienced in a community way.

Space optimization

What the Japanese do not have in space, they obtain in time through total involvement in the here and now. Space, which is rare, cannot be wasted for a hypothetical later. Unlike the Chinese who weave the art of stratagem and long time, it is the unsparing flowering of the sakura, the cherry blossoms, which embody the soul of Japan, that of the samurai who know neither parsimony nor moderation in action.

Japanese aesthetics

This lack of space combined with the need to optimize its use provides keys to understanding. The aestheticismwhich perfuses this society, and which is found in the most banal acts and facts, is in no way a veneer. It is functional in the service of an imperative of collective harmonyin society and with a nature where the myriad deities of Shinto,the traditional Japanese religion, celebrate energy. This translates into attention, listening and constant sophistication, including suppression as in the dry gardens of Zen. This leads the Japanese to seek the essential in all things, Ki, the vital breath. If we neglect this, we can understand nothing or only half of Japanese approaches to business, particularly in its social and responsible role, and the need for wisdom that accompanies it.

What are the main Japanese cultural characteristics that may surprise Westerners?

The importance of the tacit and the implicit

These two dimensions are found in Ikujiru Nonaka's famous model ( kata) of knowledge creation, called SECI, which takes up phase by phase the taiji tu, the dynamic symbol of yin and yang. In traditional teaching in Japan, and not only in martial arts, it is not up to the master to teach but to the students to learn. It is their responsibility more than their teacher, their sensei, to be literally “ born before” whom they must imitate and follow. What if they don't succeed? Either they renounce what is a personal and social shame, or they persist without sparing their efforts. Learning is internal.

Involvement and responsibility

We could add optimized uses of rhythm, the sense of responsibilityof personnel in the company from the doorman to the CEO, or this essential relationship with nature. But I would like to conclude with the little space left to moods, and perhaps also a particular relationship to guilt. In a society where survival is necessarily collective, being at fault means embodying a danger for the group. Consequently, this danger must be eliminated, or more precisely it is up to him to eliminate himself, period. In this same vein, I have always been surprised by the extraordinary capacity of the Japanese to get involved by considering what the reality of the here and now imposes. The needs of the moment establish morality and the boundaries of transgression are flexible. For a Westerner, a society without original sin breathes, and it also inspires!

Reading advice: Le réveil du Samouraï - Culture et stratégie japonaise dans la société de la connaissance, Pierre Fayard, Dunod, 2006.