> In a 2004 book on his philosophy, he questioned Japanese people’s increasing tendency to value leisure time.
That makes one of us.
That makes one of us.
>When Inamori talks about making employees happy, he doesn’t mean they’ll be putting their feet up. His brand of happiness comes from working harder than anyone else. It’s infused with the Buddhist idea of “shojin,” elevating the soul through devotion to a task.
That's nice and all, but not if it comes at the expense of employee leisure time or pay.
I can instinctively understand the idea if I were cutting wood or doing some other manual task, but I am having trouble picturing myself at work being able to get in to the right mindset if I have multiple moving pieces in every hour of the day.
It seems to be a little more prevalent in Japan but it happens in the west too (Goldman Sachs allegedly uses them to great effect, for instance).