Young Business Executives and Japan’s Economic DevelopmentIchirō Hattori

Excerpt

Fortune magazine recently published a series of articles about the young executives in the United States. In them, the young executive is described as a man with an aggressive, confident, independent and decisive mind. He works hard, partly because the competitive fire burns within him, partly because he forever seeks “more challenge and more responsibility” and believes that hard work can attain for him those twin desiderata. I believe that this description is equally applicable to the young executives in Japan, but the difference lies in the extent to which they are allowed to put their energies, ideas, and ambition to work. Japan today is definitely a country in which the elder generation is dominant. The time has not yet come for the young generation to fully demonstrate their drive and their ability to cause changes in the traditional business methodology of today. I would hastily add to this remark, however, that that time is there just around the corner. It goes without saying that the energy and skill of young executives, if properly channeled, can contribute enormously to the growth of business and the development of the whole economy of Japan.