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Americans seeking to establish smooth business relations with Japanese firms and clients should have a grasp of the differences in service between the U.S. and Japan.
Service in Japan is exemplary.
My impression of service workers in the U.S. is that they are friendly and easy-going—but seldom committed. Good service is spotty, inconsistent. People sometimes don't seem well trained for their jobs. American customers either accept or are resigned to this. Do not expect such a strategy to bring you anything but grief in your dealings with the Japanese.
Japan has earned a record of fine, brisk, confidence-inspiring professional service. Japanese culture demands a high standard. Excuses never suffice.
Brisk represents a concept seldom associated with American service, but that is assuring to the Japanese customer. I once translated copy about light-duty trucks that depicted them briskly going about business in the city streets. To translate this economically, I sought an analogue in the American experience.
Many instances in Japan came to mind—delivery people in clean neat uniforms trotting from their trucks, conducting themselves cheerfully and professionally; the manager of a used car dealer jogging from customer to customer; the crisp service at convenience stores—but I could not imagine Americans in those roles.
I heard a story recently that typifies Japanese service. A certain manufacturer's engineer had installed new equipment in a customer's factory located in a remote part of Japan. It didn't work. The sales manager, on a national holiday, in miserable travelling weather (a typhoon was threatening), caught a flight and personally brought to the site the necessary parts, stayed the few hours needed for installation, then flew back home. This is the norm in Japan. (This is called トンボ返り, or literally a dragon fly's summersault.)
A more everyday example: go into any car dealership in Japan. You will be treated superbly because お客さんは神様 (the customer is God). An office lady will serve you coffee or tea and everyone will speak to you politely and deferentially, all as a matter of course.
Or go into a computer store where knowledgeable people are eager to help you.
Or check a major U.S. airline manufacturer's comments on their Japanese suppliers.
While a “customer first” policy is certainly helpful, I ascribe good service in Japan not to policy but to attitude towards work, a deep-seated cultural attribute that determines good service almost as if it were DNA.
For the Japanese, working is not a bane; it's being industrious. A common conversation starter in Japan is “Are you busy at work these days?” “Yes, quite,” even when said with a long face, is the happiest answer. “No” can be embarrassing, or indicate something wrong. Satisfaction comes from working, not from minimizing labor in some imagined battle between labor and management. Self-esteem is tightly entwined with being busy at work, whatever job it is.
Yes, you'll sometimes hear grumbling about too much work, but behind it is always 仕事*だからしょうがない, an almost untranslatable phrase with overtones of “it may be tasking, but do it I must.” Except that to do it is their inclination. Because it is work, it has unassailable priority. Everybody, including spouses and children, supports this.
*(仕事 (shigoto) is the word for work. We will see this again below.)
I once witnessed a remarkable exchange of words between a bus driver and garbage collectors. In the course of their work, the busy garbage collectors were obstructing a bus stop, forcing the bus to make its stop in the middle of traffic. The irritated driver snapped at them. One of the collectors snapped aggressively back, without any irony, cynicism, or complaint in his tone “仕事だから” (very loosely, “Hey, we're at work, here”). The job type didn't matter; being at work did.
Good service is essential in any business, but it must meet high standards to avoid trouble in Japan. It must be responsive, reliable, tight, and accommodating. If possible, it should be backed and lubricated by culturally suitable communication.
The Japanese attitude when a problem is reported is “can-do.” They huddle together and figure out how to fix it. Sure, sometimes there are reasons that they won't be able to, but the 5 o'clock bell won't be one of them.