Thursday, October 18, 2012

Made in Japan

These words used to carry the connotation of sloppiness not a very long time ago. In the book with the same name, Akio Morita, one of the founders of Sony tells how they turned these very same words into a symbol of qaulity.

The book tells the story of Sony, from its beginnings in the devastated ruins of Tokyo after the second world war, the enormous problems that were faced and the ingenious ways in which they were overcome, and the commitment to quality that made brand Sony what it is today. However that is not the entire book. Morita in his later life became an advocate for more harmonious world trade, a defender of Japanese policy when Japan came under attack from US in the 1980s for 'eating local jobs' and he also spent his time and energy in bridging the gap between Japan and the rest of the world on business and other levels. So the books spends a fair amount of time on how Japan does business, how Japanese think and also a little of its history. The book is old (published 1986), so some of this latter material might be dated, but it is a good, optimistic, and I dare say, inspirational book.

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