John R. Malott was a noted "Japan Hand" during three decades of service as a U.S. diplomat. He now resides in Southern California and can be reached at Johnmalott@aol.com.
The President of France, Jacques Chirac, speaks English, as does Jiang Xemin, the President of China. So when these two leaders walked alone during a photo opportunity in Paris in 1999, what language did they speak? Sacre bleu, it could only have been English.
When the Cold War ended in 1989, it brought victories for both democracy and capitalism, making them the favored organizing principles for the world's political and economic systems. As we look back over the past decade, it's clear there has been a third victory as well -- the emergence of English as the world's primary language.
Microsoft recently published the Encarta Dictionary of English, which it advertises as the first "world" dictionary of English. The editors say that the total number of people around the globe who speak or are studying English is a staggering 1.5 billion.
At present eighty percent of all Web pages are in English. Most innovations and research are first reported in English, regardless of the nationalities of the authors. They want their work to be known to as many people as possible, and that means using English.
So to keep up with what is happening in the world, you need to know English. If you have to wait for the translation, you're already falling behind.
English is important to business today because it's the language that executives around the world use to speak and write to each other. New business ideas and information spread across national boundaries in English, the link language.
Think about Carlos Ghosn -- born in Brazil, employed by a French carmaker, and sent to Japan to turn around Nissan. He communicates with his new company in English -- and talks the "management speak" that has been developed in the business schools of the United States and England.
Even in Asia, where Japan's economic presence is so large, English has become the common language of business, diplomacy, and the media. When a Thai and an Indonesian get together, or a Malaysian and a Korean, they probably will speak in English. When the Foreign Ministers or Trade Ministers of the region get together, most of them can communicate with each other in English. But it is rare that the Japanese Minister -- no matter who he is -- can join the conversation without an interpreter.
Go to Singapore or Hong Kong or Bangkok, and foreign and local business persons share common information sources -- not just the local press written in English, but also CNN and CNBC-Asia; the International Herald Tribune and the Asian Wall Street Journal; Time, Newsweek, the Economist, and the Far Eastern Economic Review.
Except the Japanese, that is. With limited English (or limited interest), many Japanese businessmen have no direct access to this information. Instead, they depend on "filters" -- namely the Japanese press -- to tell them what was happening in the world, waiting daily for the satellite editions of the Tokyo newspapers to reach their desks. And as with all filters, some things get left out and other things get distorted.
Why does all this matter?
In a world where it's estimated the volume of information doubles every nine months, the Japanese will always be playing "catch up" if they rely on others to tell them what is important.
Meanwhile the competition from Europe to Asia is accessing information in real time. They can communicate easily across borders. They increasingly work on a "common operating system" called English and the information resources that are printed and broadcast in that language.
So if Japanese businessmen continue to isolate themselves behind a linguistic shield when business is being conducted, as Bill Gates says, @ the speed of thought, they will miss many business opportunities. They won't come in contact with new ideas and ways of thinking fast enough.
It is one thing to conduct research and find out that foreign consumers prefer one color to another for existing and relatively slow-changing products like automobiles. It is something else to keep up with developments in the fast-paced world of high tech and the internet, or to learn what makes foreign consumers tick on the inside. But it's that kind of insight that is invaluable in identifying needs and creating new products and services.
Today's buyers have more choices -- and more demands -- than ever. So you have to know your customer, no matter where he or she is around the world. As the saying goes, if you don't meet the customer's needs, someone else will.
Understanding your customer's needs and thinking is even more essential in a world in which trade in services continues to grow in importance. "You can't touch, hear, or see your company's most important products -- services," writes Harry Beckwith in his classic marketing book, Selling the Invisible.
Perhaps that's why most of Japan's service companies, from advertising to transportation, have failed to establish any meaningful global presence, instead choosing the safer but smaller niche market of serving Japanese companies overseas. But that's another story -- and another column!
Economist Paul Krugman of MIT wrote in 1999 that there is a direct correlation between English proficiency and economic growth. "Want growth? Speak English," he says. "The common denominator of the countries that have done best in this age of dashed expectations is that they are the countries where English is spoken."
The most important step the Japanese can take to improve their ability to communicate with the rest of the world and ensure their international competitiveness for years to come is to strengthen their English language capabilities.
Teaching English has always been big business in Japan. But for decades most Japanese studied English because they had to, not because they saw any value in learning it. The focus of instruction was not how to communicate. Instead, English was "taught to the test," helping students acquire the knowledge they needed to pass college entrance examinations.
Masumi Muramatsu, one of Japan's greatest English speakers and the pioneer of the simultaneous interpreting industry in Japan, says, "Some people say we should abolish the English exams that are required for high school and college entrance. For myself, I think that everyone should learn English. But it is true that when students think of English only in terms of an examination -- when they don't enjoy learning it and don't see any benefit from it -- it takes all the joy out of it. They look forward to English about as much as Americans do to math tests!"
Bob Sharpe, a former New York banker who headed the American Chamber of Commerce in Japan, described the situation best.
"English is taught in Japan's schools like we used to teach Latin. It's a dead language. You're expected to know how to read it, but no one expects you to communicate in it. How many Americans who studied Latin in school could speak it? But in the old days, a reading knowledge of Latin was considered useful and the mark of an educated person, so you studied it because you would be tested in it. Well, that's what English has been to the Japanese."
But English is not a dead language. It is a vital part of today's world, and the Japanese business world is slowly starting to understand this.
Some Japanese firms have started to emphasize English-language ability in their companies, setting up training programs and testing systems that match employees to the job. To measure English capability, many companies are using the Test of English for International Communication (TOEIC), produced by the Educational Testing Service of Princeton, New Jersey. The Japanese reputation for English is that they can read it but not speak it. Over time the TOEIC will force change because it measures not just the ability to read English but also to understand it: half the score is based on a listening exam.
Nissan, for example, has established four levels of English ability, based on TOEIC scores. It then assigns these levels to different jobs in the company, based on how much English is required for each position. Marubeni, the large trading company, has a similar system. Plus it provides advanced language instruction on how to listen to foreign news, conduct business discussions, negotiate, make public presentations, and so on, in English.
Japan is on the verge of another "boom" in English learning. But this time it will have a very practical and professional twist. Japan's companies and the people who work for them are starting to recognize that English is indispensable to their future. Want to get ahead? Learn English.
The task ahead is to convert these new attitudes into real change. That requires an understanding of why the Japanese have fallen behind the rest of the world in learning and using English. That's the focus of Part 2.
