The Leadership Japan Series By Dale Carnegie Training Japan

Leaders Be Persuasive   A friend of mine was lamenting that he had not taken the time to complete our High Impact Presentations Course. He had had it in the back of his mind for some time, that he really ought to work on these key skills, but had never managed to lock it down and actually do it. Now he is facing a really, really big pitch and he knows his capacity isn’t where it needs to be. He is not fully confident he can be successful. Uh oh!   As the leader we represent the “face” of the company. People judge the whole thing on what they see us do. Usually, they don’t get to peek behind the scenes like we see famous entrepreneur Gary Vaynerchuk from Vaynermedia doing with his daily video blog called the “Daily Vee”. Our public persona is usually much more contained and controlled. Internal meetings are internal and we can be a bumbling, horrible communicator and only our long suffering staff are any the wiser.   Public forays do pop up in the most unexpected places though. It might be the school PTA meeti

Accountability In Your Team     Holding our people accountable is one of the basics of being a leader. They flounder, deadlines pass unheeded, things get missed, work is not completed to a satisfactory standard.  Why is that?  People are not trying to fail in their jobs, but they do let the team down with their poor performance and lack of accountability.  What can we do about it?   As the leader we have to start with ourselves. The most crucial resource we have is our time and how we choose to use it.  If we are poor time managers then we apply unnecessary stress to our own lives and those of our colleagues.  We show up with unreasonable turn around times for work, because we were not properly organized.  We become very stressed and that spreads like an epidemic across the team. Our stress immediately impacts our mood control and our mood can lighten or darken the workplace within seconds.   We are time poor because we haven't done a good enough job on defining our priorities.  We are also rushing around bec

Boss Stimulation Is Needed   Our education moves through many transitions.  We do our basic academic education at school and university and then we hit the university of life.  Company education programs begin with very basic induction sessions.  We may be studying technical subjects for regulatory requirements or the firms specified areas for further study.  We might get some rudimentary soft skill education, although the majority of companies rely on OJT - On The Job training, particularly in Japan.     During the middle management years we might get some leadership training or in the case of large firms be despatched to some worthy academic institution for a week of executive training.  The instructors are academics, the case study method is a favorite as is group work.  Often the course colleagues are from around the globe.  The whole thing is fascinating and very cool.  The nature of the approach means we are usually focused on the middle to distant future.  Very macro and broad in nature.     It is hard

Get Ready For Your Productivity Nosedive     Brace yourself for everything to take a big hit. Speed, attention to detail, output, results are about to fall off a cliff. No this has nothing to do with currency rates, trade regulations, tariffs, gunboat diplomacy or anything Donald Trump is about to do as President. This is here in Japan, right now and mainly relevant in the major cities. This is when JPY750billion is about to get taken out of domestic consumption, lowering the nation’s GDP by 0.6%.   Roughly one third of your team in Tokyo are going to become a lot less productive, as they battle with the demon pollen plague that hits every spring. Cherry blossom time has had the gloss taken off it substantially, since the cedar pollen levels have risen to such grandiose heights. Those pinky-white buds herald the onset of a living hell. It is hard to concentrate when you are crying and your eyes are so itchy you think you are going to go crazy. Just to offset these maladies, you can insert massive intermittent

Hey Donald Trump, Try “Winning Friends and Influencing People” Instead   Donald Trump’s phone call with Malcolm Turnbull, Australia’s Prime Minister was major news. The tastier parts of that conversation were leaked from the American side, but the style and language reported seems to be in keeping with Donald Trump’s style, so they are probably true. Did he have to take such an aggressive approach with Malcolm? Could he have dealt with his concerns over bringing people into the US in a different way?   The issue here is Trump doesn’t want to honour the people swap agreement previously made between Obama and Turnbull. His choice to criticise Turnbull over the phone was a poor one. Dale Carnegie came up with 30 Human Relations Principles and Donald Trump would do much better, if he followed them. As Dale Carnegie noted, you get more cooperation with honey than vinegar.   Principle number one is “don’t criticise, condemn or complain”. The thinking behind this principle is to take into account human psychology. W

Buying People  When we buy a company, we are buying the people and all the “assets” - plant and equipment come with them, rather than the other way around. The due diligence gets done, the books are looked at carefully for any signs of “cooking”. Hidden debts, secret undertakings, compliance and regulatory issues are scrutinized. The people part however is given a “once over lightly” look because this is much harder to do thoroughly, than the other investigations. HR can tell us a lot about the structure of the pay arrangements, who are the high potentials, previous performance review results and the current staffing levels. Gauging staff productivity however is much more obtuse. The silly part though is that this is exactly what we are buying – staff productivity.   Often, the perceived productivity gap is “fixed” by firing staff to reduce costs and at the same time drive the leaders to push the team harder for higher revenues. This scenario usually doesn’t happen straight away. It takes time to get a sense

Still Stinky Performance Assessments   Seems hardly a day goes by when yet another big player announces they are no longer using annual performance assessments. Basically, this is a combination of clever corporate PR and a recognition that their managers were not up to the job of leading their people. Performance assessments have moved from once a year to twice a year as a formal construct, to now regular discussions between leaders and the led. Has anything really changed except the patina of modernity and cutting edge investor relations department propaganda?   The issues are the same. How do we evaluate our teams, how do we determine who to promote or reward with pay rises, bonuses, higher commissions etc?. How do we get some consistency across the entire organisation, so that the same performance level is evaluated and rewarded in basically the same manner? When you have big teams this is tricky. Whether we are doing these reviews weekly, monthly, bi-monthly, quarterly, bi-annually or annually makes littl

2017: Three Day Train Wreck   Japanese language has lots of insightful sayings and “mikka bozu” or only lasting as a priest for three days is one of them. It means we wilt in our determination and fold after just three days of commitment. On day one, when we start the new year, we are full of resolve, like an aspirant priest. The daily realty as we move through the year though, saps our ability to deliver on our initial best intentions.   If you feel a mikka bozu departure coming on, over the next weeks and months, here are a couple of ideas on how to deal with that less than satisfactory turn of events.   Don’t beat yourself up You may have been setting goals when flushed with the excitement of the moment, but the cold dawn of reality has now sunk in and you realise that maybe you were being a bit too presumptuous.   No problem. Re-set and focus anew on outcomes that are achievable and which can help to build some momentum. With resolutions we tend to be all in or all out. When we realise we were actually ki

Be The Light On The 2017 Hill     New Year, new starts or not? We religiously muscle up in January to set our resolutions to improve ourselves in the coming 12 months. Often these resolutions are inwardly focused. Lose weight, get better organized, be more patient, etc. This year, let’s set a breakthrough goal and make it really worthwhile going through this process. Let’s become a catalyst, a trigger, a spark to become the light on the hill for others around us. “Be the change you want to see” is a great Gandhi quote and tremendously wise and insightful.   We can start by changing how we see others. Instead of being a perpetual “fault finder”, a corrector of errors, a righteous blade to cut those making mistakes, a terminator of the terrible, why not try another approach? Rather than putting others down for their failings, why not become a person who is a serial encourager and builder of others?   Imagine the type of workplace you want to work in? Is it rife with politics, backstabbing, petty power tussles,

2017: Good Or Bad?   There are many starts to a year. Some are based on financial years, zodiacs and calendar years. Generally speaking though, January 1st signals a new start and we are re-connected with our better selves. Those extra kilos we need to shed, getting down to the gym more regularly, eating more healthily, drinking less booze and all the other typical personal and work aspirations we embrace for a better new year to come are commonplace goals. All excellent stuff and hopefully this time we will carry through on our brilliant starts.   How about setting a serious goal though? Why don’t we make a commitment to stop complaining in 2017? This means a total overhaul of our brain. We have a lot of concerns, stresses and worries in our daily lives, so complaining comes very naturally. It doesn’t take us anywhere though. We just focus on something that is either already done and irretrievable or we express some concern over something that might happen in the future. Well it might not happen too. Perhaps

Dangerous People   It sounds quite obvious not to hire people who are dangerous. The problem is people can have a nice resume, can sound quite articulate in interviews and we buy this false persona.   They can also have a lot of energy, can be quite forthright and outgoing. They are often brimming with confidence and self-belief. On the surface, it all looks fine. The issues come out though in dribs and drabs.   They often have a weak association between their mouth and their brain. They shoot their mouth off, with great vigor, babbling stuff and easily overwhelm others around them. The content of this babbling becomes the future pain point for the organisation. Their mouths are too fast for their brains. Stream of consciousness thinking probably works better in literature, than it does in business.   I was facilitating a brainstorming session and observed a painful reality. Loud, aggressive, dim people can do major damage to companies. They compensate for their intellectual inferiority complex by becoming ve

One Of the Biggest Leadership Challenges   How do you run your business.  Sharp on the cost control, right on top of the quality, working hard on building the brand, watchful of competitors, full throttle on appealing to shareholders and stakeholders?  There is one area that is going to become a bigger headache. That is people.   I am not talking about just training them. I am hearing from leaders in Japan that they are growing more concerned about getting staff and keeping them.  In the “good old days”, there were tonnes of staff to hire and fire as needed by Japanese companies, but that is changing big time. The lack of qualified staff is hitting across more and more industries.    There are multiple job openings for new hires from which to choose.  Why would they pick your company and even more importantly, why should they stay?   We know people don't leave companies, they leave bosses.  Today there is so much information about your shop available on-line, they can check you out thoroughly before they even

The Boss As Super Coach   The younger generation are the future and they want a different type of boss. That boss has to be a new model - persuasive, able to sell the WHY of the job, razor focused on building the team member’s careers, a brilliant communicator and personal coach. A snap really – probably be able to knock that lot off before lunch. Well maybe not.   In Japan, they are not making as many members of the younger generation as they used to, so what they want becomes very critical to the boss’s ability to meet the demands of the organisation. The over 65 age bracket in Japan is currently accounting for 33.45 million people, whereas those under 15 are only 15.88 million. That youth number will continue to decline.   Meeting their expectations means survival, because if you are losing them to your competitors, then you will run out of having enough staff to run the business. You can see it now in construction companies, convenience stores, even sushi restaurants in Tsukiji, all having to find non-Jap

The Madness Of Moods     Are you moody? You might say no. You see yourself as an upbeat individual, smoothly navigating your way through the workday. Good, but the workplace is roiling with confirmed, card carrying boss watchers. They have their antennae out every time you appear, as they gauge the risk level of any interaction with you today.   Should I raise that project possibility, talk about the budget, have that revenue results discussion, etc. They have been studying your body language, your gait, face and voice with such intensity, that they can easily distinguish your mood on any given day and throughout the day.   So if you are troubled, have you been a sufficiently skilled actor to mask the emotions coursing under that bespoke suit? We radiate information to our team regardless, but do we maintain our equilibrium when everyone around us is losing theirs? When everyone is panicking, are we an amplifier or a suppressor?   We are the boss, so we set the tone for the day. If we are up, we have a much b

Personal Visionary Leadership   Normally we think of a visionary leader as someone who shows us the way forward, who motivates, encourages and inspires us. The entry ticket to becoming a visionary leader though, is to have a clear vision for yourself. We are all notorious spruikers of pungent advice for others, none of which we normally adhere to in our own lives. This is where the visionary leader’s personal credibility bit sails right out the window.   Visions should be backed up with goals. Leading an “intentional life” is a good starting point as an aspiration. This means we don’t aimlessly wander through the decades, directionless or often becalmed. We choose to garner ten years of experience rather than achieving one year of experience ten times. We choose the way forward and we choose to work hard to realise those goals we have set for ourselves.   What is the timeframe to realise the vision? Where can we start? Let’s leave the company vision thing aside for the moment and concentrate on our personal v

Become Your Own First Responder   There are billions being spent in the beauty business, the weight loss, fashion and entertainment worlds. These are the fantasy lands from where we receive our images of success. By comparison, we are too short, too tall, too skinny, too fat, too poor, too whatever. Actors, sports stars, captains of industry all seem to be living the dream and we are barely making a living.   If only I had been born to wealthier parents, in a better neighbourhood, in a better city, in a better country. I wish I had a better education or had a better job, better prospects. I wish I had been dealt a better hand in life.   Stop wishing that because you are not going to be dealt a better hand. You have what you have, you can’t change what has happened in the past, but that doesn’t mean that is all you can ever have.   Many have made mistakes, specified poor choices, taken unwise paths, and have hung around with the wrong crowd. Face it, accept it, stop fighting it - you can’t undo the mistakes of

Trust   Leaders gain automatic trust by dint of their position power.  Title and authority ensure people will toe the line, laugh at our jokes, tell us “Yes”.  This type of trust only goes so far though in gaining the willing cooperation of the team members.  In a busy life however, with so many demands on our time, we mentally merge automatic trust with earned trust and confuse the two.  Earned trust differs from automatic trust because it is based on the reality of our interactions and communication with our team.  This is the “walk” as opposed to the “talk”.  We imagine we have established a trust relationship with the team and therefore are getting their full support for our efforts to progress the business.  As Yogi Berra once noted, " Leading is easy. It is getting people to follow you that is the hard part".   Time management is closely related to trust.  The ability to leverage ourself as a leader and get others to work on projects for us, means we can concentrate on high level tasks that only we can

Running A Foreign Business In Japan    Running your own business is challenging anywhere, but Japan adds a bit of spice to the broth. According to official statistics, 70% of Japanese companies are unprofitable. Business seems pretty simple at one level – constantly seek to increase revenues and reduce or hold down costs. To increase revenues you can find more customers, more repeater customers and raise prices.  Raising prices in Japan gets tough, when you are in the churning wash of decades of deflation and when there are always lots and lots of competitors. When the consumption tax was raised previously, the economy immediately plunged into recession, which indicates the price sensitivity of the populace. The Abe Cabinet blinked and gave up on the last scheduled increase out of fear of the consequences.  The usual way of differentiating yourself and justifying higher prices is through the added value you provide. Naturally, there is a major sales and marketing effort required to get that value message out.

The Boss’s Genius Ideas     Shinya Katanozaka President of ANA Holdings came up with a genius idea. Allow the passengers to order breakfast, lunch and dinner whenever they pleased. Passenger surveys showed the clients were in full agreement. What the boss had not anticipated was that passengers would order the meals immediately on take-off, making it impossible to deliver on the promise. The plan was soon scrapped.   The point here is not about being willing and unafraid to try new things, in order to differentiate ourselves from the hoi polloi of the competition. That courage and motivation is exemplary. The real issue is that no one inside the ANA organisation told the boss the “Emperor Has No Clothes”.   When you have dynamic leaders, you often get the “success at all costs no matter what” dynamism, that comes as part of their personality package. They are mentally strong, persuasive, disciplined, hard working, intolerant of weakness, tough, masterful and basically a handfull for everyone around them.   Is

Training Women in Japan   Discrimination against women in business in Japan takes many forms. Prime Minister Abe talks about targets for women in leadership positions in companies but not much has changed. In fact, he significantly lowered the targets after barely getting started on the campaign. I am a Rotarian in Japan and it is male bastion still. Rotary is a vast international organisation with the purpose of connecting diverse professions together, to build better networks and to contribute to the community.   In Japan around 94% of rotary clubs do not have women members. My own was the same until a few years ago. Every year since I joined in 2002, we have had internal debates about accepting females into our club. The “no women” faction has basically aged and passed on, over these last 14 years.   Of course, there were no regulations stating that women could not join, but the reality was women could never pass the selection protocol because of their gender. Happily that era has now passed and we are now