your checklist

Your Check list

Alternatively, or in addition to filling in the below form, please send Tom Nevins a confidential email to tom.nevins@tmt-aba.com Or a private phone call to +81 (0) 3-6427-7055. Thank you very much!


Twenty Question Check List
for
Expatriate Executives in Japan

Toward taking inventory and assessing our management practices, reward systems, staffing problems and corporate health in Japan

1. Is there enough performance pay at your firm?
2. Are you suffering from turn-over, losing your best people?
3. Is there too much overtime incurred at your firm and are you missing out on effective control mechanisms?
4. Do you perceive that your managers do not assert the independent judgment and leadership they should?
5. Do supervisors lack the tools to manage performance/contribution problems in their units?
6. Are there too many people not contributing enough yet at pay levels that seem too high?
7. Do you have some valuable people that you fear may leave because they are not being fully utilized, stretched and given a chance to grow or are not being paid enough?
8. Is it difficult to attract good people from the outside?
9. Do you seem to be over-staffed with the wrong people?
10. Do you doubt that you are taking advantages of the many strengths and flexibilities characteristic of good Japanese management?
11. Do you have a labor union or groups of managers and employees who are more concerned with protecting mediocrity or self-interest rather than building a dynamic and vibrant corporate culture?
12. Does it appear you lack flexibility at your firm to restructure jobs and freely transfer managers?
13. Do you believe personnel appraisals could be carried out more effectively and should be a more important part of career development?
14. Does it seem difficult to effectively take out poor performers and problem employees cheaply, safely and without litigation?
15. Should probationary periods be extended and really effectively used to weed out potential problem employees?
16. As top expatriate management, are you left out of too much, perhaps deliberately isolated and not always able to influence decisions and corporate vision the way you would like to?
17. Have you been cajoled into a position where you have relinquished many of your management responsibilities and let your instincts be numbed, reluctantly accepting many of the myths and stereotypes about the Gaijin manager’s appropriate role? Have you avoided directly fixing things that you feel should be run better?
18. Should your supervisors and managers know more about how to counsel subordinates and conduct constructive joint appraisal sessions?
19. Are you one of the many foreign companies that has its long-term disability policies set up wrong, precluding you from cashing in on your expensive government insurance premiums?
20. Have you never been given or asked for and read a copy of your company’s Rules of Employment, Salary and Retirement Regulation, and performance appraisal systems?

More on how we help you -- the Expatriate Executive on
the firing line in Japan


TMT will provide you the managerial tools and rganizational mechanism to overcome the challenges you face in managing employees and your firm in Japan

  • Your perspective (and even beliefs) will change about what can and cannot be done.
  • Many of the frustrations and difficulties of managing people in this environment will melt away.
  • The Personnel Management Manual will provide answers at your fingertips to complex or unique situations common to expatriate managers in Japan. With clear vision and confidence your job will be easier and you will be more effective in carrying out your responsibilities and taking charge in Japan.

This 20 Question Check list has been filled out by:

Name

Thank you very much for taking the time to work on this. If TMT/Tom Nevins feel that we can meet your needs more effectively than any other service provider, and if our current client commitments allow us to place sufficient resources on your project, and do a great timely job for you, we will be in touch. Succeeding on important things together requires a strong desire and commitment to make critical and sometimes seemingly difficult changes. In that spirit, please do not hesitate to also send, or instead of the above form, send Tom Nevins a confidential email to tom.nevins@tmt-aba.com Or a private phone call to +81 (0) 3-6427-7055. Thank you very much!