OK Where was I?

OK I have a huge back log of Japan experiences so I guess I'll continue where I left off. OK This is still Feb of 2011!

After my Last travel post We were in Shimane. I went to the Izumo Shrine. Izumo Taisha is known for En Musubi. This was probably Mom's subtle way of saying hurry up and start a family I guess. After Shimane, we headed toward Tokyo by traveling over the mountain range back to Okayama. From there we took the bullet train to Shizuoka to stay at a hotel right at the foothills of MT Fuji. unfortunately at that point the Weather did not cooperate at all and we had a layer of fog that hung over the area. The Ryokan it self was ok but it definetly felt a little like a business hotel. It was called Tokinosumika.. There was a little christmas light show display going on so I was able to get some cool pictures of that! So all was not lost.

The next day We headed to Izu Peninsula.Izu is known for its hot springs and per sq Km there are more Hostprings than any where in Japan I hear. We headed to Akazawa Onsen!  This destination was my pick and I heard from a friend that it was super nice. Boy was it ever! check out the Website for yourself! The Hotel is owned by the Cosmetics company DHC. The View from the hotspring was wide open view of the bay! Nice!

Below is a pic from the Hotel room but the View from the Hotspring was similar but higher. If you ever go here I would not limit yourself to the Bath's in the Ryokan. Definetly go next door to the Higaeri Hotspring. (Higaeri means go home by sundown. Its for just visiting the hotspring.) There is a secret passage between the two building so you can go over with out even getting cold! The dinner, breakfast, and the Tai style massage after a hot soak was excellent!


Next up! Kusatsu Onsen! So Next trip was up past Tokyo in to the mountains towards Nagano! Kusatsu Is known for the most amount of Hot spring water flowing out per minute. It is a huge amount! Something like 2K litters per minute. So much so that In the center of town in the freezing cold It feels a little warm with all the steam. You can put your hands in the water and it is very hot.

The Place definetly has a small town Onsen village feel to it and there are multaple mini hostprings there. So much so that some times I wasn't sure if it was a hotspring or a large public bathroom. See picture. Yes that is a hotspring. Its tiny! My apartment may be bigger than that! The town was very Cozy but there are a lot of tourists here. We stayed in a big hotel near by but if you really want to get the full flavor of Kusatsu I would pick the smaller Ryokan or minshuku near the center of town. Oh one last thing Taxi's are expensive up here in winter time. 2 mile trip was $20! I couldn't believe how quickly the meter was ticking! Well at night it was approaching 0 Deg C so it was money well spent but not cheap by no means!

Ok final leg we headed back to Tokyo and stayed the night in Yokohama before my flight back home the next day.  Unfortunately here too the weather did not play nice but it Oh well can't win them all! I did npot have any Chinese food but I did go to a nice Kaiseki dinner in the hotel. Pics of some of the dishes are below! that was good!

Overall I must say this was a very fun trip we covered a lot of ground thanks to the JR rail Pass! Just for comparison my parents did not use the JR rail pass but they did have a senor club discount (which is about 40% off regular price) And their total bill per person was 70,000 YEN. In comparison the amount  I paid for this rail pass was 36,800 Yen. Basically if you ride the Bullet train more than one round trip you already paid for it. So if your going to Japan I highly suggest you get it! It is THE BEST deal around! Also If you do get it you must get it before you go to JAPAN! you cannot buy it while you are there! 

Anyway That pretty much wraps up my trip from February 2011.

I have a few more trips that I made over there last year so stay tuned!

Sorry have not had a update in a while...

Hi All Sorry I have not updated this blog in a while. My current job has kept me very busy.
Last year I spent about half my time in Japan. We have a Japanese customer that I have been working with very closely so that has been taking up all my time. Its definitely an experience working with this customer.

After my experiences in Japan, I think Japan has a major challenge ahead if it wants to be competitive with the US. Here is what I think Japan has going for it:

1. Training level is very high for the average worker.  Even an job as a McDonald cashier is given 2 weeks of training before allowed to interface with customers. This is evident even to the average tourist that visits Japan. Service is great and standardized. 
2. Pay scale is flat. President of a company doesn't make more than 10x of the normal employee. IE in theory this should allow them to keep their expenses low.
3. Workforce that is very hard working and dedicated. I think this is a cultural thing and is implanted in pretty early.. if you work hard you will be successful is the message droned in from a young age.  

With these positive points I think Japan was able to get to #2 spot in the world economy during the 70s and 80s. Heck If anyone remembers Back to the Future part 2? Where Marty Mc fly gets fired from his Japanese boss? IE the US was going to get taken over by the Japanese.  That was the perception a decade ago but after working with them I see some major flaws.What do they have going against them you ask?

1. There are too many do nothing middle managers that love to start fires to justify their existence. (this is a byproduct of aging demographics and the obsession with process and quality)
2. Because the society values conformity unique ideas are not allowed to grow and yield fruit.
3. Companies over there are not designed to respond quickly

I know I'm painting a picture with very broad strokes here, but this is just my opinion after all. 

Prime example of the 3 factors above is SONY.

They OWNED the portable music player market for years. The were the standard of excellence for TV's and other electronic. The Sony Viao series was always using new tech and was the cutting edge of its days.

What happened?  

They had everything going for them in the 90's. In the 2000s they effectively lost the advantage. Apple came and took over the portable music market and computing. Why? Because they came in with fresh ideas and innovation. Mean while Sony tried to force the consumer to what SONY felt was the way the market should go. Ultimately SONY has forever lost that market because it could not get over its own rules and procedures. The very thing (highly refined process that increased quality of their products) is what killed and is still killing Japan. ( A prime example of this is the Japanese farmer making $100 strawberries.. yes you heard me right.. $100 for a single strawberry. I'm sure it is a good strawberry but there is a point of diminishing returns like most luxury goods)

The problem I see at my customer is the same. This obsession to get things perfect does not go well with being the 1st to market. You have to make a judgement call on issues and look to see how probable a problem may be and how to deal with it. This is especially true with new innovations. You cannot micromanage innovation because there are way too many unknowns but that is what they ask for. If you can micromanage innovations it means your not really innovating, rather it means your refining. I understand the customers urge to be included in the loops, but their input really does not help the situation at all. There are way too many times where they don't fully understand the problem and they go down the wrong path in a panic state. When they go down the wrong path that leads to more questions that the middle managers make, and so on and so forth.. in the mean time the real problem doesn't get solved but a lot of paper has been generated to pacify the middle managers. 

All this running around did it really solve the problem? NO it did not. 

I would say it probably distracted more than anything. I see this way to much at Japanese companies. The average worker in Japan is probably much higher caliber but they spin their wheels pacifying their bosses concerns. Now I understand that managing expectations is important as well but it would be interesting to see if some one has quantified how much of this goes on with in a Japanese company and how much this reporting is sapping the productivity of the company. Now I know this goes on in US companies as well but there is a key difference when the middle management layer gets too big then the company will start to down size and cut jobs. This makes the company concentrate on being productive and really get back to what is important. In Japan this does happen. 

Anyway at this rate Japan will probably not be able to compete with Korea and China. I think this is more of the cause of the economy lagging for the past decade more than anything else. The fast growth is now over and now they must innovate, but in order to innovate they may have to give up some values that they covet.

There maybe still some time to change, but like a lot of thing in Japan things are very resistant to change.

Sorry for the downer entry but I hope to have more positive things to blog about soon.   I got about 6 months  worth of experience to blog about so stay tuned.