This post is also written in the following language:
日本語 (Japanese)
We are often asked by Japanese major companies if we can facilitate global meetings to convince their overseas subsidiaries of the policies or strategies of Japanese HQ. Or, they ask help them think of a facilitation strategy to achieve their objectives.
In such cases, we ask these questions to the clients.
-What are the objectives?
-What is behind this global meeting?
-What are the goals?
-What are the most difficult challenges to achieve the goals?
-What is the most unattainable thing without a facilitator? (Why do you need a facilitator?)
And it mostly turns out the client needs to take actions before designing facilitation process. This shows characteristic aspect we often see in global meetings Japanese companies organize.
I have been often involved in projects where Japanese companies with global operations were trying to deploy their ERP systems (mainly SAP) globally between 2010 and around 2015, and in many cases, the people in charge had struggled to establish the good communication with the local counterparts.
IT leaders often point out
‘Our foreign subsidiaries stubbornly disagree with our policy.’
‘They think their way of doing things is the best way and won’t budge’
‘They don’t understand the value of standardising operations.’
‘They are only looking at things from the frontline perspective, not from the management perspective.’
Our clients try to solve this situation by hiring professional facilitators, but the problem lies before facilitation. It lies in common issues for many Japanese companies, such as
-The line between mandate and request is unclear.
-Lack of convincing reasons to change something.
-The people in positions of responsibility are unable to make decisions.
As an organizer of a global meeting, unless you address these issues, no matter how good a facilitator you hire, it will not work.
So, how should you prepare? I will discuss the following.
Clearly Define the Line between “Order,” “Request” and “Discussion”
First, when a global company headquartered in the U.S. instructs its overseas subsidiaries to adopt a standard system decided by the head office, this is clearly an order. If the head of the subsidiary disagrees, he or she will be replaced by the one who says “Yes”..
When it comes to Japanese companies, even though they are in a position to give orders, they are not able to do so adamantly, and they try to persuade or request. This looks very tolerant attitude which allows autonomy, but it causes confusion in the overseas subsidiaries.
In English-speaking cultures compared to Japanese culture, people generally draw a clear line between an order and a non-order. In Japan, however, this is a gray area, and all orders and requests might sound “You can decide as you like it”.
From the Japanese headquarters’ point of view, they don’t comply with the HQ’s orders.
In order to convey the intent of HQ accurately, you must clear following segments.
-What is absolutely non-negotiable (orders)
-What you want to persuade
-What you’d like to discuss and then you can delegate
And you must draw a clear line between these segments. Particularly, the second one is very important. The second one means what you want to persuade but you can delegate after all. Unless it’s an order, you may have to give up on persuading eventually. You should have the determination to be willing to leave the decision to the local side.
Suggest the concrete benefits for the local side instead of promoting the philosophy of “What it should look like”.
Generally, Japanese people try to convince with the philosophy of “What it should look like”. However, the rationale of “What it should look like” is not convincing.
Japanese tend to believe standardization is good in any context. For example, one of the benefits often advocated for the standardization of mission-critical systems is “Visualization of management”.
But just visualizing management doesn’t gain the corporate value. When some effective action is taken after visualization, it brings the corporate value.
Unless you reveal the concrete plan for the actions, when, where, what, how they would be taken after visualization, no one advocates that. It could be dismissed as “Meaningless”.
What you’re supposed to do is to suggest the concrete benefits for the local side instead of promoting the philosophy of “What it should look like”.
The notion, “ERP is a system for management and not for the field,” doesn’t work. Only the benefit encourages people to do something.
Be prepared to make bold decisions that can be expected.
When visiting overseas subsidiaries for global deployment of core systems, IT department managers, who normally hate business trips, are eager to visit overseas subsidiaries. Yet, the issues is that the manager cannot make decisions on the spot.
Under the Japanese corporate system, many decisions are made by the management committee, and few decisions can be made at the sole discretion of the IT department head. And the decision making takes very long time.
This situation frustrates overseas subsidiaries.
It is unlikely that authority would be extended at short notice. Making decisions in advance is the solution. You must be able to assume what decisions will need to be made prior to the meeting. So, you should prepare pre-decided options and choose the most acceptable option for both sides among them on the spot.
You should avoid to bring back the topic to HQ and make a decision afterward as much as possible.
You should address the global Meetings with affluent preparation and strong determination.
Facilitator’s value is to think about the best meeting process according to the objectives, goals, and background, and facilitate the process. Meanwhile, the meeting organizer’s preparation, or readiness, is crucial for a global meeting of a multinational team.
In actual cases of facilitating global meetings held overseas, the most important part of the facilitation process is the facilitation for the client to confirm the preparation and readiness.
In some cases, we may only assist with agenda design and have the client go to the site alone.
We hope you recognize that preparation and determination are fundamentally important.
