Yes to Me

(Photo by venkane)

As an immigrant, I can see what Americans take for granted.

I have lived in the US since 1995. I am fully aware of its problems. Yet, I think America is still one of the best places to succeed for someone who is ambitious and hard-working. The sad fact is that many Americans don’t realize it – they have lost the immigrant spirit, which was the spiritual foundation of the country, and just whine while sitting on their status-quo.

Let me tell you two major issues that I believe have been bending the mind of many Japanese for decades and thus have limited the economic growth there. See how you think America fares in these areas.

1. Discriminations that confine the growth of talents

Discrimination leads to systematic loss of good ideas and great talents. It judges the idea by the person who presents the idea rather than by the idea itself, and it judges the person by their attributes rather than by their expertise. I think it is quite amazing Japan has done well in the past despite deep-rooted discriminations such as . . .

Sexism
You must have a penis to be promoted in Japanese companies. I have been involved in the Japanese business community in the US for over a decade, and have dealt with several hundred Japanese businessmen (expats) either as service provider (I used to work for international banking department of a major bank) or as colleague, and never met a Japanese business woman sent directly from Japan. I recently read a news article that Nissan started promoting women – and that made a front page coverage in the business section of a US newspaper . . .

I heard there is an equivalent of affirmative action in Japan, but with no penalty. No penalty means it is just a decoration. Sexism at work is a common practice in Japan, and many Japanese women tolerate very low wage jobs because they can’t find other options.

Ageism
Age discrimination is not only present but in the written rules of many Japanese companies. There, people must retire at certain age. Many companies also limit the maximum age of new hires, viewing older applicants as “un-educatable.” People are put in age hierarchy, which limits free and expansive thinking and communication. In this rigid society, people age quickly – at age 25, I was repeatedly told I was too old to get a job or to get married. (I heard they recently raised the cut-off line to age 29. . . How nice.)

Racism
Many Japanese insist there are no racism in Japan because it is a homogeneous society. Nothing is farther than the truth. First, Japan is not “homogeneous.” There are Ainus in Hokkaido, and people in Okinawa consider themselves as different from the mainland Japanese – for good cultural reasons. There are also tens of thousands of Chinese and Koreans living in Japan. By ignoring them, many Japanese render themselves to the worst form of discrimination.

Further, many Japanese (secretly) subscribe to old racism. I have worked for three Japanese-invested companies in the US, and never saw a black American in senior management. Beside the Japanese expats, all senior management were white men, with one white woman among them. (One female representative is considered necessary to avoid the accusation of sexism.)

2. Social myths (tatemae) that only gives disillusion and distrust to those who know the reality (hon-ne)

You’ve heard lots of good things about Japan. Well, many are not true. But if you ask a Japanese about it, he or she would probably say it is true – because they know they are supposed to endorse it. They do know the reality is far from what is advertised, but have no way to express their concerns outside their inner circle. This split mentality causes confusion. Over time, people lose enthusiasm even for really good cause – they’ve been disappointed with the discrepancies of promoted good cause and the reality just too often. It’s an anti-thesis of Pavlof’s dog. When disappointed too often, they may shun away even at the sight of a real treat.

Some well promoted myths are . . .

Good school system
Japanese score well in many tests. But the real contributor to the high scores is the cram school, not the regular school. Japanese kids (I mean elementary school kids) work until 9 pm at cram schools. They have no energy left by the time they enter adulthood, no interest in real learning, and no creativity.

Low divorce rate
It is low for a reason. Did I say getting a reasonable job is hard for women in Japan? Especially for older women (read: women over the age of 30)? For them, divorce means freedom in poverty. Add to that the social shame still associated with divorce. The image of marriage in Japan is one-way ticket to mystery house – no exit whatever you find there.

Good health
Japanese do live long. Many older folks are bed-ridden for years, but yes, they are kept alive.

I am concerned about western researches that report things like “Japanese (or Asian) women don’t suffer from menopause.” Do they realize that those women are under social pressure NOT to discuss physical discomfort? When I was working for a Japanese-invested company, I once made a mistake and complained about my shoulder pain. The Japanese sales VP snared at me and said, “That’s menopause . . . oops, I’m not supposed to say this in America, huh?” It’s been years now and I still have my period very regularly, so obviously it was not menopause. The point is that women are conditioned not to discuss physical issues – if they do, they go under the storm of social ridicule. (My example is really nothing compared to what goes on back in Japan.)

Oh, I love America!

I am still a woman, no younger than I was when I was in Japan, with yellow golden skin and a bit of accent, and none of these stopped me from getting great jobs, and I can even start my own business! I can say what I believe to be true, and because I have kept my honesty and integrity, I feel passionate about the causes I believe in! Thank you, thank you, thank you.

Red on to my story of coming to America . . . and how it is so like becoming an entrepreneur . . . here.

Thanks to Jeremy at Struck in Traffic for including this post in American Economics Carnival.

For more insights on spiritual growth, click here.

(Photo by Andreia)

Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Relevant, and Time-Bound . . . What is wrong with this goal?

I’ve lived in the corporate world many years, where the SMART goal setting is used in performance review. It was full of hypocrisy, but that’s just the corporate world, I thought. At finding out this approach used for personal development, however, I feel obligated to write how it can belittle you and fail you to achieve your big dream – like finding joy and passion in your own business.

SMART goal setting is for project management.

As Wikipedia says, SMART goal setting was initially developed for project management. When you manage projects over a period of time, you do need Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Relevant, and Time-Bound goals. You figure out what specific steps you need to take to reach your big goal, assign time frame for each step, review periodically to measure how much you have progressed. Each step must be broken down to relevant achievable mini-steps. This way, the big goal is less overwhelming and more actionable . . . so far so good . . .

How SMART goal setting is used in performance review

In Corporate America, you are supposed to come up with SMART goals like this:

(As a Quality Manager) I will reduce quality issues (specific) by 20% (measurable – and let’s say this is achievable) by purchasing and installing the new high-tech test machine by May (time-bound).

(I don’t understand why anyone would set irrelevant goals. I think “relevant” has to be there to make it a cute sounding acronym SMART.)

Notice that the goal is about project management, not about the person, the Quality Manager. You can’t evaluate a person this way. This manager may be a great team organizer who is trusted by his subordinates, follow up with customers well and keep them happy despite the quality issues, yet may fail to install the new machine in time for a haphazard reason. . . Or he may be a horrible micro manager, and the only reason his subordinates stay at work is that there are few other employment opportunities in the area, the team spirit is low and there is really no aspirations to do a good job, yet he may manage to achieve the SMART goal.

His boss may add other SMART goals to address this contradiction, like keeping the retention rate low. Well, the nice manager may fail this goal, too, because even though his subordinates were happy working with him, several of them had life changes and just had to leave the company. . .

SMART goal setting is based on linear thinking and its scope is too narrow.

The reality is when people (especially many people) are involved, nothing is really linear. There are multiple factors affecting multiple factors in multiple aspects. And a person cannot be evaluated by several narrow-scope criteria.

(The biggest hypocrisy of performance review in corporate America, however, is not even about the inadequacy of evaluation method. It is the fact that, no matter how well you score in the evaluation, you don’t get the reward, such as pay raise, based on the evaluation result. The reward is set prior to the performance review based on company finance and the temperament of the top management. For example, they decide that everyone gets 3% raise, with the few exceptions for those who have direct impact on company survival, such as key sales personnel. So even if you did outstanding job, you get no more than 3% — your manager is not allowed to give any more. And this is why your manager nitpicks at review – he needs an excuse for granting shabby reward. If the top is mean, they might even pick the non-assertive, more “understanding” employees and tell them the company cannot afford to give a raise this year, while providing the standard 3% raise to others.)

Your potential is bigger than SMART goals.

Let’s say you want to start a business. As a step, you decide to read two business books a month and start writing business plan in three months. This kind of specific goal is good as it gives you something to work on. But what if, after reading the first great book, you are so inspired that you find yourself ready to test your business idea? Will you call the potential venders now, or do you follow your initial SMART goal and keep reading more books? Or why not do both – start talking with potential business partners while reading and studying more? This will probably bring in more insights, and in three months, you may achieve far more – or quite different – results.

You are a person, an organic being, not linear. You have resilient body, world-reaching mind, and eternal spirit. You don’t need to be broken down to small pieces and managed, even by yourself. You are the person who is in charge of your projects.

Dream big and start doing something about it!

The biggest problem of SMART goal setting is it advocates “achievable” goals. Achievable goals are small goals that can be measured in certain time frame. But who decides what is achievable?

If you are interested in something, start doing it now. Taste it a little bit, and then decide if you want to proceed further. You can set goals as a way to the means, but don’t let SMART goals to limit you.

Thanks to Alex for including this post in Personal Development Carnival.

What’s stopping you from starting your business? Click here for the sidekick.

(Photo by Sleestak66)

The customers are demanding attention. You address them the best you can, but there are so many that you can’t keep up with them all.

The bigger your business grows, the more customers are asking questions and complaining about more and more issues. You want to treat your customers well, but you just can’t stretch any more . . .

Believe me, this will happen sooner or later when you become an entrepreneur and your business takes off. Even when you offer outstanding service or products, there will be inquiries and also complaints about perceived problems. What do you do?

It seems the majority of business owners choose one or both of the following two options:

1. Work longer hours
2. Get other people’s help (ie, their time), starting with your family members and then hiring others

Both approaches above are based on linear thinking.

You are addressing each problem one by one, and each problem solving takes certain amount of time, so the total time needed to solve all problems is the sum of time each individual problem solving takes. Obviously, you need more time to solve more problems this way. So you either work longer hours yourself or, realizing your human physical limitations, you get other people’s time. The quality of your personal life, your health, your relationship with family, and the bottom line of your business suffer when you approach problem solving this way. You started your business with passion and lots of wonderful dreams, yet you find yourself dreading . . .

It doesn’t have to be this way.

There is another approach that radically shortens the time needed to address customer service problems while keeping the level of your service high, even higher than before. And you can learn and use this approach right away even if you are currently an employee. In fact, I strongly recommend we all practice using this approach as it is so effective that it will change your work life.

It is to learn systematic thinking and implement effective system.

Let me explain with real-life examples, one by Christine O’Kelly at Self Made Chick and another my own experience.

In How to Achieve Ridiculous Goals, Christine explains how she, as a new Operation Manager of a start-up company, cleared 80,000 customer email backlogs in 3 weeks. She says it took more than a year for the backlog to build to this level. There weren’t enough number of customer service reps to answer these emails one by one. Just demanding them to work faster didn’t work, either. So what did she do? She says:

I created a system analyzing the most common customer service questions, creating pre-made responses for each of the main types of questions, ran the 80,000 emails through a series of keyword-based filters to identify the topic of the email, separated them each into different “buckets,” and then had the CS team run these through a rigged up process that would send out back the correct auto response to each person. In exactly 3 weeks, the backlog was cleared.

This is the power of system. It leverages time and effort. Instead of addressing one problem at a time, you create a system that can address bunch of problems all at once.

Another example . . . I used to work for a large bank (now part of JP Morgan Chase) as International Banking Coordinator. One of my main responsibilities was to take care of Japanese expatriate businessmen, who were not familiar with American banking system. It was in the 90s, and they had never used debit cards, didn’t know the difference between credit card and debit card, not to mention being unfamiliar with various security restrictions used for credit cards. My predecessor’s day was all about answering customer calls. Several months after I took the job, the angry or panicked calls were gone and I could focus on sales calls and learning about other banking services for my own growth.

How did I do it? I figured most problems can be tracked down to certain causes, and addressed them proactively in a systematic manner. As a starter, I added some info on the brochure we were using, educating them about the differences of American banking products and how they can take advantage of them. When I opened accounts for new clients, I took a few minutes explaining them, referring to the brochure, and this system of educating customers pretty much eliminated their confusion and complaints. Further, I would ask my new clients about their function as part of relationship building process, and if they were in sales or senior management, I would ask them if they travel on business to meet their customers. If they said yes, I asked them if I may remove one of the restriction on their credit card that blocks out-of-area usage. My clients loved me for being so attentive and helpful, and I became free from calls like, “ Aaaargh, I am at dinner with the president of my biggest customer and my credit card doesn’t work! What do I do!?”

To sum up, here is the basic procedure to build a good system:

1. Find pattern and categorize the problems
2. Identify the root cause(s)
3. Build system that addresses problems by the categories. Implement and verify the system.

Many people are so used to linear thinking that it will take some conscious learning to understand system. We are conditioned to just jump at the problem and “deal with” them. It takes fundamental change in thinking to sit back first to design and build the system. However, the rewards are huge. As I wrote in 5 Qualities I Find In Successful Entrepreneurs, I think this is one of the most critical skill for entrepreneurs. It is so important that I will write more about this in future posts.

Do you have your story of building your great system?

Thanks to Brad for including this post in Carnival of Sales & Management Success.

What’s stopping you from starting your business? Click here for the sidekick.