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By Steve Choi - Vice President, Educasia
On January 8, 2006, “60 Minutes” aired its interview of Howard Stringer, CEO of Sony Corporation. To see a clip of the interview, go to www.cbsnews.com/sections/60minutes/main3415.shtml. Stringer, who is British-American, admits he is not familiar with Japanese customs. He does not speak Japanese. The interview shows him committing cultural blunders such as kissing a female staff member on the cheek and receiving a business card upside down with one hand. So why was Stringer picked by Sony to replace long-time insider Nobuyuki Idei as CEO, his 30-year experience as a journalist, producer, and executive at CBS notwithstanding?
We believe Sony chose Stringer because of his unique ability to combine elements of western and Japanese culture to solve the company’s problems. Sony needs to reduce costs and be more efficient. This means letting employees go. Stringer has experience with this line of work at CBS. However, it would be a mistake to confuse Stringer with “Chainsaw” Al Dunlap, who was hired to turnaround Sunbeam Corp. in 1996.
Instead, Stringer’s management style balances western and Japanese approaches. He says: “This is a company with great traditions. I have to look after some of those traditions because that’s why the company was successful in the first place. And I am not sure that leaping on board an American business model with ruthlessness and viciousness and counterattacks all the time is a good thing necessarily for somebody else. And so taking care of somebody else’s culture is part of the joy and opportunity of this job. I have things to learn from the Japanese, and not just the other way around.”
When Stringer announces layoffs, he meets with affected employees personally instead of sending them a memo. This sensitivity to nurturing human relationships is a core Japanese value and important to communicating with and motivating Japanese employees. Some call Stringer the “affable ax wielder”.
Stringer’s management style supports our contention that rather than be familiar with surface-level country customs, managers and employees can lead diverse teams and people more effectively by using differences in cultural values to improve ways to solve problems. This approach can be organized into a framework called WIP, which stands for:
Wherever you are, remember that people are people. People develop culture to solve life’s everyday problems
Interchange elements from the corporate and local culture to solve the problem instead of saying “This is how things are done here.” Discuss what combination of cultural elements will best solve the problem
Process Improvement. Improve work processes by adopting those cultural elements that solve problems best
To learn more about WIP and customized training programs available on Managing Diverse Interactions and Conflicts, please contact us at info@educasiainc.com
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