ABSTRACT
This chapter examines the most important elements and provides the reader with a check-list of key requisites. The Japanese have had to learn about in order to take their place in the industrialised world. In order either to compete or to cooperate with the Japanese in overseas markets, and certainly in order to enter the Japanese domestic market, it is important for companies to develop a ‘Japanese expertise’: to cultivate staff, or to set up a department, specialising in Japanese affairs. Advice from someone with a good knowledge of the Japanese market is invaluable and it often pays to use the services of a good management consultant or market research organisation. There are a number of very good American and British consulting and research organisations in Japan who can be located through the Embassies or trade organisations. In Japanese organisations, the decisions originate at the lower levels where day-to-day business is done and are coordinated and approved by senior management.
