ABSTRACT
This chapter discusses the salient Japanese and Western management views, attitudes and practices in an effort to demonstrate the fact that Japanese modes and systems of management pose a very significant challenge to Western modes and systems of management. It provides the important differences between Japanese and Western modes and systems of management, sources of these differences, and implication of the differences for marketing executives and their employer-organisations. The chapter focuses on differences in the following respects: industrial organisation, decision making, staffing or human resource management, as well as quality management and customer service. A contrast is made between Japanese and American staffing practices with respect to the following aspects of the staffing function: employee selection, employee remuneration, appraisals and promotion, training and development, career development, and labour-management relations. There are numerous differences between business and management systems, views, attitudes, and practices in Japan and those in Western countries.
