Chapter 16, Problem 1TAI1

Summary Introduction

To Determine:

The reason Japanese companies prefer to have Japanese in top management positions.

Case summary:

A staffing policy in which the people are hired belonging to the nationality as of the home country for the foreign operations is known as Ethnocentric policy.

Answer to Problem 1TAI1

Solution:

Japanese companies consider their people as the best and to avoid any cultural difference, they prefer to keep their people in top management positions.

Explanation of Solution

Given information:

The reason of Japanese company preferring their own people at top management.

A company having international business setups or offices needs to analyze the approach for recruiting the person for offices located globally. There are different approaches for the recruitment process. Ethnocentric staffing is one of them. According to this approach, the managerial personnel are hired belonging to the location or the region, where the parent company is located. Due to this, the control over decision making still lies with the company.

Japanese companies are more comfortable in hiring Japanese people for the top management because they consider them the most efficient and they are more comfortable with them as compared to the other country workers. Difference in the culture of different countriesis the reason for not preferring the employees from other countries. Japanese companies believe that they have the best management practices. So, they prefer to have their own people at the top management positions.

Conclusion

Hence, the Japanese companies prefer to follow the ethnocentric policy for staffing and prefer to have Japanese in top management positions.