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Hitchens leads Zips in second-half comeback
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Seven players added to Tribe’s 40-man roster
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Holmgren expresses interest in Browns position
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Kent State blown out in second half, loses to Temple 47-13
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Four area football teams play tonight
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Will Health Care Reform Pass?
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Silverdome Potentially SOLD!
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Akron Gamer:
Nintendo's Mario endures even as games come and go
American worker talks about Japan
By Joe Hallett
Columbus Dispatch
Published on Sunday, Mar 09, 2008
TOKYO: Tee times are hard to come by on an island roughly the size of California that is crammed with more than 127 million people.
That's one thing Koki Hirashima misses about living in the Columbus area of Ohio. ''If I thought I wanted to play golf, there was someplace really close by where I could simply go out and play,'' recalled the Marysville-based president of Honda of America Manufacturing from 1998 to 2005. ''But in Japan, I have to leave very early in the morning and get home very late at night in order to play.''
As leader of Honda's worldwide manufacturing operations, Hirashima has less time for golf anyway. But he couldn't help feeling wistful about his years in Ohio during an interview at Honda world headquarters recently.
Experiencing another culture is both daunting and rewarding, and for many Honda employees, an exciting fact of life. Honda has 25 Ohioans temporarily assigned to Japan, and about 200 Japanese are working at the company's manufacturing sites in the States. Honda operations are global and integrated, and the company considers it important for workers in the United States and Japan to exchange ideas and experiences gleaned from working with customers in both countries.
Some thoughts from three Honda employees on both sides of the Pacific:
Bradley Fay
When the 12- to 14-hour days at the Tochigi plant near Tokyo begin to wear on him, Fay dons his leather, hops on his Honda motorcycle and cruises across the crowded Japanese countryside.
Traffic is crazy, but Fay uses the berm to weave through. ''In the U.S., I'd get a ticket; here it's legal, and I ride up beside the police cars and wave.''
Practically a lifer with Honda — he was hired for the Marysville plant's assembly line in 1983 — Fay arrived in 2006 for a second stint in Japan. He likes it so much that he extended his stay until 2011. At 43, Fay, who's divorced, says the toughest part is being away from his daughter, a cheerleader at the University of Cincinnati.
After transferring to Japan in 2000 to support development of the 2003 Accord, Fay said returning was easier, mostly because he understands the language better.
He has become used to the constant street noise and the crowded environment — ''I've got neighbors on top of me, below me, beside me'' — and spoiled by a culture that emphasizes kindness and service.
''The Japanese are, for the most part, much more relaxed, kind and patient,'' Fay said at Honda world headquarters in Tokyo. ''In the U.S., people seem more stressed, easier to blow up. I've never had a Japanese person blow up at me, no matter how busy they are.''
Fay has worked his way up to the manager level, and he works with suppliers in Japan to help reduce their costs and keep car-building expenses down. He says he would accept an assignment in another country.
Jun Odajima
Growing up in Yokohama, Odajima was a volleyball player who went to college to become a physical trainer. And then he began reading about Honda and was smitten with the company's philosophy: a global view to provide products and services that exceed customers' expectations.
It took a while, including a stint at a Honda used-car lot, but Odajima finally landed an assembly-line job in 1989 and, before long, impressed his bosses with a 10-page report on how to advance Honda globally. Six years after his posting to the public-relations department, Odajima was transferred in 2005 to a place he didn't want to go — Ohio.
''I didn't want to work outside of Japan at all,'' he said at the Marysville plant. ''But this was the assignment and I thought this is a good opportunity to go up. . . . I'm here to support my team members and to help my company. It doesn't matter whether I like the assignment or not. Once I accepted this, I changed my mind from negative to positive.''
In what is expected to be a five-year stint in Marysville, the early days were the toughest for the 42-year-old Odajima.
''I was so scared. Five years! Five years! How am I going to do this? I couldn't speak English well. I couldn't say anything in meetings because I couldn't understand what they were talking about. Suddenly, someone would say, 'Jun, what do you think?' And I'd say, 'Well, ah, well, ah, I'm sorry, I cannot say.' ''
Finding a home, a school for his sons, ages 15 and 13, a doctor, phone and Internet service — nothing was easy for an English-challenged Japanese transplant.
''Everything was a barrier and, at the same time, a good experience to learn something about this country.''
His wife and sons wanted to move to America, so they accepted the change easily. And over time, the language and everything else got easier for Odajima. He likes the openness of Americans, his house in Dublin with a yard and basement — ''The space, I couldn't believe that, and very cheap'' — and the fact that his two-hour train commute in Japan has turned into a 20-minute car ride in Ohio.
''My wife and kids don't want to go back to Japan. They'd like to stay here.''
But Odajima, senior staff administrator in the corporate-affairs department, has soaked up the American culture and the way things are done at the Marysville plant. He knows he will be even more valuable to Honda when he returns to Japan, because he was given a chance to flourish in America.
''This country is respectful of the individual: What is your uniqueness, what is your strong suit? I like this U.S. style. . . . The Japanese style is together, uniform.''
Tom Shoupe
The son of a Baptist preacher from Butler County, Shoupe went to Miami University and learned to drink a little beer, which would be helpful years later in Japan.
He became an aide in Washington to former Republican U.S. Rep. Michael Oxley of Findlay. He was sent by Oxley to Anna, Ohio, to talk with Honda officials in 1988, ''and I never went back.''
Before long, Shoupe was managing the East Liberty car plant, not bad for a kid who was reminded then by his father that ''you couldn't even change your own oil.''
Shoupe, 47, who managed the sprawling Marysville auto plant and now is senior vice president of Honda of America, learned the business well. The day before his boss asked him to move to Japan, he learned that his wife, Lisa, was pregnant with their first child.
''My boss said, 'That's great, they have babies in Japan, too.' ''
In 1993, with a 5-month-old daughter, the Shoupes found a house in an all-Japanese neighborhood outside Tokyo, not far from his plant.
''As I was laying there that first night, I could hear everything my neighbors were doing in their houses,'' Shoupe said. He eventually relished ''the litany of experiences'' that came with living among the Japanese for two years. Shoupe had a 12-week course in Japanese before moving, but it took six months before he began to fully grasp the language.
''I can understand a lot more than I can speak, which is handy at nomikai. It's a drinking meeting, and it's very important."
Nomikai is ingrained in the Japanese business culture. Co-workers or clients get together to drink, usually after work, but Shoupe remembers a nomikai while he and an associate waited for a train.
''They were unofficial and just critical to understanding business and cultural relationships,'' Shoupe said.
Since returning to Ohio in 1995, Shoupe has traveled to Japan frequently. Each time, he said, he felt he was home. But it's been two years since his last visit. ''I'm having withdrawal right now,'' he said.
TOKYO: Tee times are hard to come by on an island roughly the size of California that is crammed with more than 127 million people.
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