High school baseball championship and Karoshi
High school baseball championship and Karoshi
Last weekend my friend dropped in at my apartment. He is a great baseball fan. He said he was going to see the High school baseball national championship final(in Japan). I'm not interested in baseball, so I asked him why he liked watching high school baseball. His answers was that he liked to see players, young highschool students, are putting his all into their training and try to do their best in their games. They look genuine to play baseball. That was his answer. There are many people who like highschool sports such as baseball, football or rugby. But I guess they like to see young people try to do their best hard, they don't like sports it self. Watching sports make it easy to understand how hard they are making efforts.But I'm not interested in highschool sports championship. I think they are trying to do training too long hours, 4-5 hours everyday with no break, no day off. That's clazy. The psychology, which is oriented to hard training, could lead to pschychology of Karosi"death from overwork" in Japanese companies. In Japan, it is highly evaluated to do same things as others do and not to show their weakness, not to complain. It seems that they are doing sports or jobs to show their faith to the group, which they belong to, rather than enjoying playing games. This puts very heavy pressure on us.In my company I haven't heard any Karoshi cases but I hear some middle class managers have been absent for long time. They were given too much work, which was beyond their capability, but in my company there is a heavy atmosphere that we must not say that the plan is difficult or impossible to achieve. So when middle managers are given a certain project, even if it looks impossible to achieve, they must do it without any excuse. That's ridiculous.What is more, my company is basically on seniority system basis, age-based evaluation system. It is recently trying to introduce performance-based evaluation system in part, though. So there is not so great difference in salary of managers. It has not so great impact on managers' salary whether they can achieve or not their goal. In spite of that, they are working hard. And there is a common psychology or atmosphere between Japanese highschool sports and Japanese companies, which fastens up them."Harmony of group is first priority." "The nails that stick up get hammered down." Those two proverbs express such atmosphere very well. Those who stand out either by voicing their own opinion too directly or by exhibiting loud or showy behavior are typically rejected by the group. And people are trying hard to keep up with other members of the group. That means he is excluded from the group.In other words, Japanese are apt to think or act with consciousness of one's group. For example, I read an article about an English language school in USA for learners of English as second language. If there is only one Japanese in the class, the Japanese feel free to speak in English.But if there are some Japanese, they are reluctant to speak in English, that's because they are conscious for other Japanese.Where did such habit come form? I think it came from Japanese agricultural society. Japan is an island country. Many people have clung to the little level land that is available for agriculture. And water had to be shared among villagers. They had to help eachother with their work. A person was ostracized by the village, if he doesn't maintain its harmony. And the reigning system in Edo era in 17-19 Century for about 250 years was the system to utilize such village system to reign the people. That forced each of villagers to keep an eye on each other and inform any strange people, dubious people to the authorities. Such society had kept for 250 years. And in those days Japanese government had a policy to close the country against foreign countries. It was a kind of cult society. The mentality which people had acquired in those days has continued until now. This is the origin of Japanese characteristic of group conformity.
Last weekend my friend dropped in at my apartment. He is a great baseball fan. He said he was going to see the High school baseball national championship final(in Japan). I'm not interested in baseball, so I asked him why he liked watching high school baseball. His answers was that he liked to see players, young highschool students, are putting his all into their training and try to do their best in their games. They look genuine to play baseball. That was his answer. There are many people who like highschool sports such as baseball, football or rugby. But I guess they like to see young people try to do their best hard, they don't like sports it self. Watching sports make it easy to understand how hard they are making efforts.But I'm not interested in highschool sports championship. I think they are trying to do training too long hours, 4-5 hours everyday with no break, no day off. That's clazy. The psychology, which is oriented to hard training, could lead to pschychology of Karosi"death from overwork" in Japanese companies. In Japan, it is highly evaluated to do same things as others do and not to show their weakness, not to complain. It seems that they are doing sports or jobs to show their faith to the group, which they belong to, rather than enjoying playing games. This puts very heavy pressure on us.In my company I haven't heard any Karoshi cases but I hear some middle class managers have been absent for long time. They were given too much work, which was beyond their capability, but in my company there is a heavy atmosphere that we must not say that the plan is difficult or impossible to achieve. So when middle managers are given a certain project, even if it looks impossible to achieve, they must do it without any excuse. That's ridiculous.What is more, my company is basically on seniority system basis, age-based evaluation system. It is recently trying to introduce performance-based evaluation system in part, though. So there is not so great difference in salary of managers. It has not so great impact on managers' salary whether they can achieve or not their goal. In spite of that, they are working hard. And there is a common psychology or atmosphere between Japanese highschool sports and Japanese companies, which fastens up them."Harmony of group is first priority." "The nails that stick up get hammered down." Those two proverbs express such atmosphere very well. Those who stand out either by voicing their own opinion too directly or by exhibiting loud or showy behavior are typically rejected by the group. And people are trying hard to keep up with other members of the group. That means he is excluded from the group.In other words, Japanese are apt to think or act with consciousness of one's group. For example, I read an article about an English language school in USA for learners of English as second language. If there is only one Japanese in the class, the Japanese feel free to speak in English.But if there are some Japanese, they are reluctant to speak in English, that's because they are conscious for other Japanese.Where did such habit come form? I think it came from Japanese agricultural society. Japan is an island country. Many people have clung to the little level land that is available for agriculture. And water had to be shared among villagers. They had to help eachother with their work. A person was ostracized by the village, if he doesn't maintain its harmony. And the reigning system in Edo era in 17-19 Century for about 250 years was the system to utilize such village system to reign the people. That forced each of villagers to keep an eye on each other and inform any strange people, dubious people to the authorities. Such society had kept for 250 years. And in those days Japanese government had a policy to close the country against foreign countries. It was a kind of cult society. The mentality which people had acquired in those days has continued until now. This is the origin of Japanese characteristic of group conformity.
posted by sekiya at 4:43 AM
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