An administrative style that depends on staff from the parent company or Japanese personnel cannot globally and quickly implement business strategies with limited personnel. Of course, the local staff are much more able to do this well.
  In the past, there was a period during which I sent sales support to Singapore. This is because there are many Japanese companies in Singapore and there were many requests by clients for such a service.
  Let me introduce the scenario that Kato Spring employed at that time. It is an order for transfer in two years' time. This causes the concerned individual to think, "Oh, I am going to Singapore in two years. I need to study English." This even causes some to earnestly view the English programs on public TV that they had never watched before.
  This order transforms a Katoite into the blotter paper that was described earlier. The Katoite also promptly reacts when the characters of Singapore appear in newspapers or magazines. Consequently, such information networks naturally begin to have an effect on the person.
  In fishing, bird watching or whatever, people with interest in these subjects that have made them hobbies are able to accurately judge the information that is necessary for them from the enormous amount of data that flows before their eyes in a disorderly manner. This type of psychological behavior becomes very active.

  The transfer order for two years hence becomes a definite opportunity for the individual who never knew they were going to Singapore or would use English to study these matters. In addition, compared to studying begun in an international business atmosphere without any objectives, or that is vague, the ability of the information to enter the brain is much, much better. This also serves as a means for heightening the planning ability of the company member.
  What kind of stimulation is needed to change someone from the condition of "oily paper" to "blotter paper?" This point is critical for associate management.
  The number of people who move after being ordered to has steadily been reduced. These are people who respond "yes," but when they go to the new site they actually do nothing. Humans only do what they are motivated to do. People demonstrate phenomenal performance when they truly want to do something. The era is now one in which this fact must be seriously dealt with.

  Kato Spring has prepared a variety of self-education chances for Katoites in order to create the culture of "Cheerful, Enjoyable, Lively, and Exciting. I did it!" We are using the "power of words" as much as possible in this process as an important element for giving Katoites opportunities to come into contact with the associates culture and jump into it.
  The aforementioned "From Five Club" is an example of this. The system of ordering transfers two years hence also has this meaning. There are many such examples of the "Language of Kato."
  There is a club at the Fukushima Factory called "Paul to Ippuku" (A Break with Paul). Paul is the nickname I was given when working in America. The lunch meeting in which I eat with a group of Katoites regularly was named in this manner. The Kashiwazaki Factory has the "Yuushoku-kai." This is a play on the kanji character "yu" of my name Yuichi and the "yu" character that means "evening" with "shoku kai," which means "meal meeting." With this information, one might imagine that the word Yuushoku-kai means "evening dinner meeting," but it is in reality a lunch meeting.
  There is also a club called the "Coffee Club." This term has the following, slightly stiff, explanation in the "KATO Glossary" released following the compilation of Kato Spring's 50-year history.

  Creation of Future Energy & Excellence - A meeting of young management. Ten Katoites of grades 5 and 6 and the president meet once a month to discuss matters during their one-year term.
  The aim of the meeting is to provide the president with information updates, for innovative and revolutionary opinions of the young Katoites to be presented to the president and for the education of future executives. Although the form of the meeting is similar to a general meeting of young management, we decided to call it the "Coffee Club" instead. This was to give a home-like quality to the serious content of conveying administrative policy in a simple manner, providing advice for becoming an executive and to hear frank opinions.
  The members meet once a month for a period of one year, after which each workplace selects new members. However, even after the term is over, we continue to communicate by exchanging e-mails once a month. This meeting began in 1989 and we are currently in the second round, referred to as "Coffee Club 2." The members of both clubs are a group of people at the frontline of each division who are not directors of the company.

  I often hear of various cases of trying to shorten the distance between the workplaces that have been implemented by many companies. Omron Corporation, one of the first to indicate a fight with large corporation sickness, has advanced its internal reformation in a manner very much like the Omron culture. Some of the steps include "Letters to the President" and discussions between the president and frontline company members called "The Ring" and "The Direct Dialog." People like Mr. Oizumi, who was the first to raise his hand to become a member of Strawberry Corporation, have been nurtured through "Coffee Club 1" of Kato Spring.
  I said earlier, "A company is a virtual world where the president and company members stand in equal positions." Apparent in this statement is a world in which each individual has a clear presence. If a company member raises his/her hand in the Research and Development Section, it is impossible to recognize who he/she is if the section has a name like No. Y Section of No. X Department, which no one in or outside of the company can understand. To combat this, Kato Spring uses the names of its managers for organizational names, such as the "Takamiya Development Office" and the "Koike Development Office."
  It is clear that an organizational concept that divides matters with terms like "middle management," which appear to have an actual presence but may not, is clearly at odds with the associates system.
  The reason I aggressively scout people with potential outside of the company and I have steadily developed a hand-made personnel development system that avoids a boring homogeneous education system is because I earnestly want to continue somehow building the associates culture and I want to prove "Win-Win" management there.
  As I mentioned at the beginning of this chapter, my objective of reanalyzing the traditional slogan of "companies are people" through action is becoming clearer and clearer.