Chapter 5 Culture, Management Style, and Business Systems 151 CROSSING BORDERS 5.3 Hofstede’s Dimensions and the Gender Divide— Who Is mas MAS? Japan and its “Devil Wives” In Hofstede’s dimensions of national culture, Masculinty (MAS) has more to do with how gender roles are defined and separated than with machismo. That is, cultures high in Masculinty are characterized by men doing one thing in society, and women quite another, and the roles do not blend. Scandinavian countries, who typically score low on Masculinity (high in Femininity) view men and women’s roles more interchangebly than many other countries, as evidenced by Exhibit 5.4: Norway and Sweden top the list of the number of women on corporate boards. In Scan-dinavia, men and women are granted equal amounts of time off when a baby is born to the household. The “daddy track” (taking a lesser job to take a larger role at home) is no shame; neither is the “mommy track.” It’s quite a different story in Japan, ranked number one in world in the Masculinity scores in Hofstede’s data. Although “women only” buses and trolley cars exist in many countries (such as Mexico and Malaysia), Japan takes the role separation of MAS to new heights. The Japanese corporate world is a male’s world, where legions of “salarymen” toil long into each night for the greater good of “Japan Inc.” Women stay home, retaining complete control of the household budgets, children’s activities, and vacation plans. At the opposite end of the spectrum from Scandinavia, only 2 percent of Japanese corporate boards are comprised of women. This is more than an economic division of labor. It’s deeply rooted MAS culture. Terue Suzuki had a baby, but also “had a satisfying job and really wanted to go back to it,” she says. A woman choosing to do so, instead of stay-ing home to look after the needs of children and husband (as 70 percent do), is called an oniyome, or “devil wife.” A newspaper article about Suzuki’s rare case popular-ized the term, which gained widespread awareness when national television aired an 11-episode drama called Oniyome Nikki, or Diary of a Devil Wife. Public policy officials, from the prime minister on down, are trying to change all that, for more reasons than a discriminatory national culture. With a near world-low fertility rate of 1.41 children per woman—well below popu-lation replacement rates—social benefit programs for the burgeoning retired population cannot be supported by an ever-dwindling workforce. Relatedly, the current Japanese economy, now in its third decade of listless performance, can largely be revived by larger numbers of women in the workforce, according to Prime Minister Abe: “Enhancing opportunities for women to work and be active in society is no longer a matter of choice for Japan. It is instead a matter of the greatest urgency,” he said. “Abenomics will not work without Womenomics.” One company is trying. Lawson Inc. (which operates 11,000 24-hour convenience stores in Japan, comparable to 7-Eleven) has 20 percent of its workforce of 6,500 comprised of women, partly because of a former Japa-nese regulation that prohibited women from working after 10 p.m. In recent years, however, half of its new hires have been women. Currently, only one of the company’s 28 executives is female, but the company has set a goal to increase the number of women senior vice presidents to 30 percent within five years. With 7 out of 10 of Japan’s employers in a recent survey saying that starting a family makes a woman less employ-able, such efforts face an uphill battle—and don’t count on the currents of culture shifting any time soon. The latest popular hot spots (with an 80-minute stay limit) for singles these days are called “butler cafés”—exclusively for women. Men dressed impeccably in long-tail tuxedos and white gloves cater to the female (mostly working young women) patrons’ every wish, greeting them with “Good evening, prin-cess.” You’ve heard of geisha girls? Meet the geisha guys! Sources: “Reviving Japan with ‘Devil Wives,’” Bloomberg Business Week, November 12, 2012, p. 13; “Holding Back Half the Nation,” The Economist, March 29, 2014, pp. 23 – 24; “Where Japanese Women Rule,” Time, February 5, 2007, p. 47; “Untapped Talent,” The Economist, July 7, 2014, p. 62; Don Lee, “Japan is Pulling for Its Female Workforce,” Los Angeles Times, August 21, 2013, pp. B1, B6; Kirk Spitzer, “Japan Looks for a Few Good Women to Revive Economy,” USA Today, January 17, 2014, p. 7A; Hiroko Tabuchi, “Shaking Up the Boardroom in Japan,” The New York Times, June 25, 2014, pp. B1, B4. As world markets become more global and international competition intensifies, U.S. companies need to be represented by the most capable personnel available, from entry level to CEO. Research shows that global companies are requiring international experience for top executive positions. Executives who have had international experience are more likely to get promoted, have higher rewards, and have greater occupational tenure. The lack of international experience should not be a structural barrier to breaking through the glass ceiling in corporate America; to limit the talent pool simply because of gender seems shortsighted. The good news is that things are improving worldwide for women in manage-ment, and the topic of gender in multinational companies is receiving increasing research
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