The Red Button Creeps Closer and Closer

Next to the office door at Look Japan was a white board containing the names of every employee, in their order of seniority, from Shacho down to lowly me, the newest employee. One of the names on the list always had a red button next to it, and each day the button would move to the next name on the list.

The button indicated whose turn it was to lead chorei (朝礼) that day. Chorei translates as "morning assembly," and every work day at Look Japan commenced with one. Chorei is customary in many Japanese companies, particularly the more traditional ones, and Shacho was very insistent on this custom being followed. In fact, Shacho was so fond of chorei, it was said that he believed that a company was not a company without it.

The rest of us hated chorei as much as Shacho loved it, especially when it was Shacho's turn to lead it, because while everyone else was anxious to get to the work piled on their desks, Shacho would drone on and on. I hated chorei because it meant that I would have to give a speech in Japanese, and each day as I saw the little red button getting closer and closer to my name on the white board, my sense of dread would increase.

Not that it really should have. The rule was that your speech could be about anything. Some people would talk about work. I tended to talk about some experience I had recently. The speech did not even have to been in Japanese, as we had English-speaking employees who spoke little or no Japanese. It didn't matter. We each had to do chorei when it was our turn. That was what made us a company.

Even though I dreaded chorei, I learned to live with it, and even to use it to my advantage. For example, do-yo no ushi-no-hi is a day in July that traditionally marks the height of summer and is thought to be the hottest day of the year -- a tradition that obviously predates the introduction of the thermometer. Japanese have a custom of eating eel that day, because it is loaded with iron and thought to help you withstand the heat on the hottest day. In July 1992, shortly before I left Look Japan, my turn to lead chorei happened to fall on that day. I wanted to eat eel, which is quite expensive, and I thought that, if I brought up the custom that morning, Shacho just might treat us to eel for lunch. So, for my chorei speech, I simply said, "今日は土用の丑の日です。うなぎを食べましょう" (Today is do-yo no ushi no hi, so I am going to eat eel").

It worked like a charm. Shacho immediately jumped in and said, "What a great idea! Let's eat eel today!" Not only did he treat the entire company, but we all got to leave the office for a few hours in the middle of the day to go to the eel restaurant down the street.