Why Japan sends its samurai managers to a training hell

Press, 29 June 1983, Page 13

Why Japan sends its samurai managers to a training hell

From

PETER McGILL

in Tokyo

The warrior spirit that once led Japan to military conquest is being cultivated to inspire thousands of company employees to wage war as “business samurai.” At Japan’s largest outdoor management school, trainees are not taught how to maximise profits and reduce overheads. Instead, they are subjected to unrelenting military discipline, forced marches and intensive brainwashing that crushes rebellion. The school prides itself on putting managers through hell. “Any pride will be destroyed. When you get here, forget your past, your money, everything,” says Naoyoshi Fujimori, an instructor at the school, which lies hidden among woodland at the foot of Mount Fuji. First tasks of new recruits is to fill out an insurance form to cover any accidents that may occur. Business suits and other personal possessions are exchanged for white smocks modelled after uniforms of the Imperial Japanese Navy. Then they are led to a hall for the initiation ceremony, where they kneel in rows on the floor. Staff of the school ensure their backs are upright by prodding the slovenly with the wooden shinai sticks used in kendo. Each recruit is told to stand up and introduce himself in a loud and forceful voice. Those who fail to reach the required volume and huskiness are told to shut up and wait their turn again. Humiliation is used constantly to “purify” the trainees. “This place wants bodily

reaction, not thinking,” Fujimori warns. Most trainees receive 17 ribbons of shame to tie to their smocks, each one denoting some discipline to be fulfilled in order to graduate: simplifying orders, speedy and accurate reading, building self-confid-ence, manners, penmanship, positive thinking and so on. Tests are given every morning and afternoon. If the trainee gains an acceptable number of points, the appropriate ribbon is removed by the instructor in front of other members of his group, who stand to attention in a mock medal award ceremony. The day’s routine begins at 4.30 a.m. each morning with the appointment of a new leader for the group. Martial arts exercises are held in the dormitory at 5, followed by a brisk towelling of the torso with a cloth. From 5.30 to breakfast at 7, students are given writing and dictation tests. Work resumes at 8 after 15 minutes to clean the dormitory. On my first visit a “discussion group” was meeting on the lawn. The theme was whether it is a good idea to go straight to the office in the morning or to go straight out on urgent business. A trainee was trying to persuade the others of his point of view by violent arm gestures and the power

of his voice, with the instructor nodding encouragement. At the next table, another group was sitting down to a spartan lunch of rice gruel, banana, and mountain potato after a characterbuilding 12-mile forced march. Another 25-mile march in the dark, considered the limit of endurance for the average student, was to come. A torch, water and rice are all that are allowed on the marches. Blisters afterwards sometimes require hospital treatment. “We lost our way many times and I often thought to give up,” says Akira Hashida, a 33-year-old junior sales manager, who stood bolt upright in response to my question. “But, afterwards, I was very glad, I cannot explain this feeling of self-confidence.” The most bizarre aspect of the training came after lunch, when 16 managers changed back into their blue-serge business suits and piled into a bus to go to the nearest town for “singing exercise.” The businessmen stood in front of Fujinomiya station and took turns to belt out the “Salesman’s Song” at maximum decibels to satisfy an instructor standing 50ft away among members of the bemused public. “You have sweat on your forehead,” begins the ditty. ‘The product you have made with the sweat of your hands. What you produce

with tears, you have to sell with tears. Don’t feel down, salesbird,” bellowed a middle-aged manager, face crimson with effort. “Not good enough. Do it again,” ordered the instructor. “I think it’s to concentrate energy or something,” ponders a woman out shopping. “It’s pitiable, really,” says her companion. Back at the school the group underwent “soul injection training” which consists of endless “from the heart” repetition of the same song, as well as the “Ten Commandments of Being a Manager” which have all been painfully memorised: ® “Not too much fellowship with others. © “Administrators must always face solitude, so that they can pass on directions and obey orders from the president, no matter what junior staff may think. @ “If you cannot take the heat, better not be an administrator.” And so on. Other exercises being slavishly followed that day were memorisation by rote, in which a student is given 600 words of meaningless text and made to repeat it faultlessly. After 50 or 100 attempts, the words bypass the brain and become a kind a reflex. When tired, the students are given “sleeping training”: everybody lies down together for 30 minutes. Politeness is considered an essential virtue, almost equal to obedience. Entering a room is always preceded by “excuse me” and meals by standing to attention until the instructor gives permission to begin eating.

Everything is controlled, down to taking a bath, which is a huge communal tub lined with picture windows looking on to the lawn. Trainees line up naked before entering and must read the “bathing instructions” four times in a loud voice. Japanese companies like Nissan, NEC, Matsushita, Toyota, NTT, and Sanyo, as well as smaller name firms throughout the country are willing to pay $l5OO a head for the full 13-day course, and almost as much on an eight-day course that leaves out the 25-mile march. A special 13-day course in English (they sing Frank Sinatra’s “My Way” at the station instead of the “Salesman’s Song” in Japanese) is even more expensive. Turning flabby executives and tearful women clerks into Green Berets of the business world and Amazons of the office is very profitable for the guru of the school, Ichiro Takarabe, whose

aphorisms and “philosophy” form the core of all that goes on there. With some 5000 trainees a year, the school grosses about a billion yen — more than $6 million a year. For most of the trainees, their careers hang on their success in enduring the torments and hardship of the course. “The company sends reports on the character and weak points of the employees sent for training. If they are thinking of promoting someone, they send him here,” says Fujimori. “If somebody fails the course, they are usually tired. If they decide to quit the school, they quit their company.” Some strong characters (the school prefers to brand them as “weak”) manage to resist indoctrination. Fujimori recalls trying to persuade one man to complete the course against his instincts. After three hours, he “escaped” — he walked out after writing a resignation letter to his company.