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Harmony in life and harmony at work—the Japanese ideal of 和 (harmony; peace) informs practically all aspects of Japanese society including business. In the workplace this often means decision-making and responsibility are attributed to the group instead of individuals, making eDiscovery a challenge without understanding this cultural distinction.

One Summer at Grandma’s

During my 9th grade summer, I worked part-time at my grandmother’s cloth-manufacturing business and came upon a brilliant idea to improve efficiency. Never mind that everyone around me had over 10 years of experience and knew all there was to know about my job. I explained this inspiration to some employees, and they reticently nodded in what I interpreted as approval.

Feeling good about myself, I went about the week implementing my idea only to overhear later that some of the products were falling apart. Upon investigation, the faulty items had been my doing; the “efficiency” I so proudly carried out had amounted to cutting corners. No one told my grandmother or uncles about my “improved” method, and the employees quietly fixed the mistakes on their own. They were preserving the harmony (和) of the workplace. If there was an issue, it was an issue with the group that needed to be addressed by the group.

This concept of collective responsibility was new to me as someone raised in a culture where people are held personally accountable for their mistakes.

“All for one, and one for all!”

The Three Musketeers motto, “All for one, and one for all” embodies the collective nature of Japanese business culture. Decisions are often made by groups. There are meetings upon meetings to arrive at a consensus among managers and executives. In this environment, determining who is responsible for an action becomes an involved eDiscovery undertaking as searches for terms like “responsible” and “blame” would likely yield little.

For example, I was involved in a matter where we needed to determine who was responsible for making a series of pivotal decisions regarding testing results in a Japanese company. In American business, it is typically clear who is giving an order and in what capacity. However, pronouns like ‘us’ or ‘we’ (or no pronouns at all), are often used by Japanese management in describing actions taken, making attribution of responsibility difficult. This was certainly the case here.

Without the benefit of ownership statements, our task became a non-linear investigation. In addition to looking for key words and assertions, we had to piece together emails, texts, events and relationships to understand when, and by whom, crucial decisions were made. This brings home the importance of shifting review paradigms when looking at documents of another language and culture.

Saving Face

Speaking as part of the group also serves to uphold the importance of saving face (顔を立てる) in Japanese society. It is considered highly disrespectful to do anything that denigrates or hurts the dignity of another person and placing the onus of responsibility on the group/company is one way of preventing this. In other words, regardless of who made the mistake, the blame is placed on the group while preserving individual honor.1

1 Takei, I., & Alston, J. P. (2018). Japanese business culture and practices: A guide to twenty-first century Japanese business protocols (2nd ed.). iUniverse. (Takei & Alston, 2018, p. 7) Practically speaking, this means employees are not likely to be singled out for their actions, at least publicly.

To illustrate, let’s say manager X communicates to her superior that, “We only submitted lab results from last week to the agency.” If the superior thought this was a mistake, he may have replied, “I believe we should rethink this. Let’s make sure moving forward there is a system in place that ensures all lab results are submitted monthly.”

In this example, the manager’s use of an ambiguous pronoun makes it difficult to determine who is responsible for the action. Furthermore, the superior’s avoidance of personal pronouns makes it unclear whether he was also involved. From an eDiscovery standpoint, additional examination of relationships, hierarchies, and further exchanges regarding the subject become necessary to understand who the final decisionmaker was.

There is no “I” in Team

Japanese eDiscovery is about listening to several voices speaking on behalf of one group- it’s not just about language. Reviewers should be able to see the forest for the trees, so to speak, to understand where accountability lies when reading Japanese documents. Here, cultural fluency is more than simple comprehension; it’s knowing what patterns to watch for and where. And in the world of eDiscovery, that can be critical to the success or failure of a case.

Glenn Yamada, Counsel; Foreign Language Review Services

Glenn Yamada is a seasoned e-discovery attorney at Hilgers, where he brings over a decade of expertise working in high-stakes, complex litigations. Follow him on LinkedIn here.

1 Takei, I., & Alston, J. P. (2018). Japanese business culture and practices: A guide to twenty-first century Japanese business protocols (2nd ed.). iUniverse.