Important Business Lessons We Can Learn From “Made in Japan”

“Made in Japan” is a term that is automatically associated with premium quality products. Successful Japanese companies like Sony, Toyota, and Panasonic have now shifted from manufacturing direct branded items to controlling the supply chain of the consumer electronics industry. Japan uses several strategies to maintain its position as the leading raw material supplier for several hi-tech sectors.

Global dominance 

Japanese companies never compromise on quality and strive for global excellence keeping constant improvement as their goal. Japanese companies started to control the world’s raw material sources necessary for the IT industry boom from the early ’80s. They created a monopoly in the market when it came to chemicals like silica and other core components.

Japanese companies achieved this world leadership by implementing excellent leadership strategies. OpEx Learning provides Six Sigma White Belt, Yellow, Green, and Black Belt training for company executives who strive to stand above others. Their comprehensive course includes everything from leadership training to analyzing case studies and doing projects.

Befriend every brand 

Japanese companies stopped creating products from scratch and marketing them with the “Made in Japan” tag. The fierce competition from the South Korean and Chinese brands selling mass-produced consumer electronic products for minimal cost threatened them. Several companies went out of business but many regained their position by changing their production strategy.

Instead of creating a product from scratch, they start supplying things necessary to develop high-quality consumer electronic goods. Japanese companies who always give high importance to quality use their image to provide premium quality spares and raw materials to the entire East Asian consumer electronics market. They started to befriend every brand instead of making their particular brand stand out and multiplied their profits enormously.

Small and beautiful companies

The Japanese government provides all the necessary help for small and medium-scale enterprises to thrive. They list over twelve important manufacturing technologies that help small companies to manufacture products akin to them. They produce all the parts and control all the materials necessary to create satellites, motors, aircraft, computers, and other essential communication devices.

If the Japanese market is affected, it will influence the entire global supply chain, and all the huge Fortune 500 companies will suffer plummeting investments. The small-scale entrepreneurs of Japan control several companies proudly proclaimed as “small and beautiful” are helping the world produce world-class products with high quality “Made in Japan” inner parts.

Learning from mistakes 

Japan ruled the consumer electronics industry in the ’80s but soon lost to South Korea and China in the upcoming decades. They failed to use the IT revolution by creating notable software engineers and realized the world had moved on to integrated circuits relatively late. They learned from their mistakes quickly and started to target the next colossal market – semiconductors and silicone.

Japanese company Shin-Etsu is the largest manufacturer of Silicon necessary to make several products from bricks to computer chips. Japanese companies Toray and Teijin control many aircraft manufacturing raw materials ownership. Toshiba is one of the world’s top ten semiconductor manufacturing companies.

Quality speaks for itself

“Fine manufacturing” is the motto of Japan that makes them gain the upper hand compared to mediocre quality Chinese products. The word “Made in Japan” has a distinct association with high-quality products worldwide. Though Japanese products had stopped dominating the electronics market directly now, their raw material production has retained power indirectly.

Several top electronic companies worldwide, from Apple to LG, depend substantially upon Japanese semiconductors and silicone. Japan had made its name as the supplier of the best raw materials for the world electronics market. Every company that wants to produce premium quality products comes to them automatically.

Advice on Finding Summer Internships

It’s March Madness. No, not college basketball season. Internship finding season. People post on Facebook where they got accepted, you hover over your email waiting for an acceptance, others scramble to get their last minute applications in… Sound familiar? As I approach my third and final summer as an undergrad student, I reflect on a thing or two I’ve learned along the way.

Here’s how the internship search goes: (this was me as a first year vs. now)

Then: “Maybe I’ll try to find something near home so I can be with friends and family.”
Now: “I DON’T CARE WHERE IT IS. ACCEPT ME AND I WILL MOVE.”

Then: “I think I’ll take this summer to explore a bit. I don’t know what I’m doing.”
Now: “I’VE WASTED MY PAST SUMMERS! I NEED THIS INTERNSHIP FOR MY CAREER NOW. ACCEPT ME.”

Then: “It’d be nice to make some $$.”
Now: “UNPAID? NO PROBLEM. I’LL MAKE IT WORK.”

Then: “Summer is so long.” 
Now: 
“SUMMER IS SO SHORT.”



WHERE TO START:



FUNDING:



OTHER QUESTIONS TO CONSIDER:

  • Do you want to study abroad? Will you have a chance to study abroad during the school year? Or will you have to do it over the summer/after college?
  • How can you maintain relationships with your employers/mentors after your internship/externship ends? I knew a student who was offered a summer research position with an alum after a Spring break externship with her.
  • Why are you interested in a certain program? How does it fit into your personal and professional goals? (this question is asked on pretty much every application)
  • Do you have any hobbies or extracurriculars that could some how relate to an internship or program you are interested in?
  • When are your application deadlines? Don’t wait last minute to ask for letters of recommendations!
  • Are you aware of what people around you are doing/applying to? Maybe they know more about a specific program you are interested in. Maybe they did the program and can tell you about their experiences.
  • If you didn’t get in this year, how can you strengthen your application to apply next year? Sometimes the directors offer informal feedback on your application.

So there you go. The answers I wish I knew sooner. You’re welcome.

There are a ton of internships/programs I should have applied to. There are a ton of internships/programs I have applied to multiple times. I know it’s discouraging to apply to programs the second or third time around when maybe you feel like you should have outgrown that program already. So go on to bigger, better things, but always apply to some backups.