A Word on Words; 0936; David Gelsanliter

christian program building in the world of books this week talks about jumpstart your host for word on words mr john sigg and co chairman of the freedom forum's first amendment center good evening ladies and gentlemen once again welcome to word on words the ceiling i guess is the author of a book about a subject that is a great interest to all americans the role of japan an icon in an outboard motor ministry my guest is david johnson either written this book jumpstart jumpstart it will be made soon into a paperback and beyond book stands all across the country welcome david words if you write that he let me out again by him asking why the story of japanese involvement an arm

at the mott economic lifeline that's what he'll movement through that is so pervasive i mean you would think by this time that american industry american ingenuity american economy american government would have responded to the challenge and the good ole market way and an answer is because these challenges that they've why they haven't is that the question like the japanese had been able to come in to the middle west in the upper south in a way that was unexpected i think they've been able to make cars here is these good qualities in japan i think the detroit people felt that that couldn't happen i think they've been able to do it with you know non human arm and i think that he's been a surprise i think the big three american big three felt that wrong it couldn't be done and now they've

come in with with billion dollar plants in tennessee and kentucky and ohio in and are continuing to gain market share very rapidly in and out the reaction in detroit as we've seen with president bush's recent visit to japan is this fear that it's too late to turn around the japanese momentum what was it that until you to wait in those areas like jobs and from a small town kerry seaton about the same size as mayors who were on the news i smarter where the soldiers georgetown work i hadn't been home a long time i came back and saw a lot of people driving japanese cars and japanese trucks like and remember that ever happening before my dad would never driver or make our been like for me to drive for me and i was looking for a book idea and

i've heard that the nearest village about fifty miles away there were people with no more than a high school education barbers and waitresses farm kids making thirty thousand dollars a year and one hundred and heard that the union you interviewed can injured or doesn't and was unsuccessful it seemed like a story that hadn't been told and i went over and start asking around in and a lot of people don't want to talk to me that i'm on a windswept you could keep it a secret really what the success was less we've persisted in and one of the top forty two gorgeous woman the site away to get them to talk more was down to kentucky and see what was happening with toyota and down to the same thing was happening with nissan the fact that i was straight talk with all three companies

that all non one to be outdone by the others so was that in every angle a competitive races really and using this story from one against the other that made possible for you to get them to open up so that you have a foot the door and then then and then reggie think they come to trust you that they check to see whether whether you have a hidden agenda they check to see whether there's a consistency in your approach they're anxious to know whether you've got assumptions you're trying to prove or what you're just trying to find out the story and reggie they came to trust me as did the uaw on and they invited me to japan was there corporate greed in your judgment as a uaw failed your daddy failure at nissan for example surprise many people because going into that election is you know

are the union overlook that office syrian people to speak for the union finally decided on him on monday a nissan were going to be their leaders of the mccain spokesman right there were harsh words for the press was their youthful charges of injuries injuries like a safety on the line on the other hand management get close now tied with you address up in the last thing that's rife with high and as a as a publisher and a community certainly that we have relatively few complaints from management even though my management was getting a short in the press that goes uaw was talking and making these allegations and and the company decided not to publicly respond to many of them and

him remarkable absence of a press effort on the part of our country and why did it fail you know weighted failure judge well i think i think a defining moment her was maybe a year before when when the son had endured problems and they had to park some thirty thousand cars and trucks and cornfields in the airport around smarter and whenever that happened the big three plants and layoffs other shutdowns whenever they have these huge image or problems and that's when the lead a bigger loan records signed in the thing that happened in the sun was they did lay anybody off they instead they just lowered the line and the train people and it was a conscious decision of the sun and took you to do that on to send a signal that there was job security that even in tough times they would lay off and from that time forward

nissan would would run on their in house television sets news about gm closing news about chrysler are shutdowns the continual sort of message that they kept kept playing was that you job security here there's no job security at these unionized plants and i think that message got through the recently they kept the press out the last eight weeks i asked him about that they needed they did talk with whitney selectively during that period as to the uaw was going back and forth between the two and in nissan's position was that we what it's important for us to talk to our employees we don't want to have our attention diverted by having to respond to charges in the press on their public relations coming here in the national bison not to do that to boston to keep talking the press they rejected that advice in in

essence was had captive audience sessions with their with their employees and just reinforced again and again the message of job security in and told the story of strikes at that big sleepless convinced employees of that they should vote for coming in and the infected tooth you want and i think it surprised the national media on the little things you are debbie was surprising the uaw and privately where they remove their surprise they lost wages but it was a defining moment i think in the end maybe american labor history because the unit is not gone back since then and trying to work that would i think that the local media around the summer probably at a sense there were contacts people thousand in both soak in the heck have a sense that the company had a chance to win and look upon the favor uk

as represented in representing some sense of security with the way the campaign was no at the same time i think everybody expected that this was an effort to get the camel's nose under the tent that the first election would be close enough so that would be in the second elections are in all male would be end of the third well i mean the result was such a stunning and resoundingly feet for the union it was impossible for it has been impossible for him to take off as a second there's a second ever now sought to take it that that fear that that sort of tells the story of the relationship between management and the people on the line in the sun is that characteristic of what goes on in in in toyota's a georgetown our head of what is it is it somewhere in all three of those plans despite the fact that

despite the fact that different companies or violas think they're there are more similarities and differences of the nissan has more of an american company than the other two a thinker martin started the saudi program here had a philosophy of having only a very few japanese and bring in a lot of american managers and the honda is solve the other extremely well my book was published in nineteen ninety and some seven hundred japanese mother now in making it today and about three fifty but in toyotas sort of in the middle but yeah i think there is a common pattern they think crossed train people they may have fewer layers of management and big three companies i have job security people tend to wear the same clothes which means if you don't have the class distinctions that you haven't seen any american companies they're more similar isn't

difference is what makes a toy yoda the year the leading japanese comet thatcher what is it that makes two oil to excel sales over over nissan and honda i think there are their approach is simpler they rely more on people and less on technology they start and toyota city which is a rural area south of a good a good way south of tokyo i think a big been more consistently been at serving longer than honda has been nice and they have a product line that stood the test of time better than the sun nissan has a new model that there is going to compete with the accord in the camera which they hope to rectify that this is coming up now on i think consistency simplicity have more financial resources than any other than youtube

they're also the most concern became the last days last weekend at kentucky last and are they watched what the others did what mistakes the others made on and try to get better they had fewer japanese and honda they didn't get into confronted labor relations battle that nissan didn't mean there's some feeling in the sun's very confronted any union position may have heard some their sales are no when you were when you started but the book was completed in the story was told and it was behind you know the things in science writing tools now puppies later publisher was cut out of a river it up that you know back in the interview her it out i'd gone back to to go back to you don't have undergone a nissan and toyota

in the last week and on i pose a number of questions in the final chapter of the harbor and i think that answers to some of those questions no one is that is that honda has now passed grocers the number three passenger car as his toyota one question is whether the uaw was going to organize these plants in their three hundred suppliers and the answer to that is probably not another thing that's new is is that japan bashing that's that so we've had ever since the soviet union went belly up it seems like america needs an enemy in and on and on for some people in japan is it appears that all three of the leading japanese companies are now sort of pull back slightly give the big raising their prices higher than normal they can reduce their exports from japan to the us they're not going to go in the middle sized trucks which would which would

hurt get chrysler in and gm and during this election year is politically or think they're gonna allow the biggest american big three breathing room to regain market share if they can i think that's their strategy during this tour in nineteen ninety two and go to the first of nineteen ninety three i think if the biggest american big three jack up their prices in or maximize profit rather than to gain market share that i think we'll see the same trend that we saw we've seen in the last year from the japanese instead of gaining again detects the politicians the current may say well our problem is that american industry thinks in terms of moments japanese think in terms of decades in iowa that's a cliche or was some validity to a farm ten years down the road

and they don't worry about quarterly earnings improvements i think that's one thing that the dramatic difference between american companies and in these three countries at least the name of the game as the market share the name of the game has been continue for quality improvement the name of the game has been new model turnaround sort of faster rate of term in that bar becomes three and four year terms again they seem to be willing at a slow that down i'm on in the interests of giving the american victory breathing space that seemed to come next the top you think that's a political decision yes no i think it's comes coming from toyota has said they said said this to me when i was in japan they said that toyota bashing is perceived as

japan persia goes where the looting we're sort of a leading company in japan we have to be very sensitive to an unlikely and has taken the lead in raising the price of the camry higher than that seems justify pulling back and i think they're setting the pattern for her nissan and honda which are falling in line doing the same thing now the question is how long that will last time owners across takes a look at nissan and is enticed into establishing fifty miles away from the city center on her plan to reduce is the center of all of the older son initially at least be in a competitive years says the time you come in here you have a level playing field i suppose

having to do with you it and it makes it less than wellpoint you sure that because i do think there are there are around and in contract that jones has created a saturday there are differences that they get something close to what level langfitt what about the concepts i don't work for joe miller's and saturn monitoring his was working fairly well the problem is i understand here in dc is that they've brought in people from the north from ohio northern iowa michigan wherever and there hasn't been the kind of community acceptance yet love that the people and many of them from fly home on the weekends i think one of the reasons they put their plant there was not very far from nissan was in the hope that the way debbie there would would impact the employees of nissan and it would be easier to organize nissan

nissan recently harris has agreed to double in size its factories get so my perceptions are not too worried about that if you and i listen to lee iacocca then there's a voice we might not have to listen too much in the future since chrysler's can have a new leader we will hear him say that to our government was responsible that japanese subsidies were responsible they've never been willing to really acknowledge that chrysler products were judged by american consumers as inferior to japanese about what about the idea of a level playing field i do have a feeling that japanese dump and cheat and that there is a record to demonstrate that i would

one generalize as perhaps it's known selectively also of reason that they do produce quality automobile of an that they sell i'm at a competitive price and that we get beyond the subsidies and the dumping energy in the final analysis it is the paleo meal it grabs american consumer and makes a difference so even if the lab even if their government made a level of greed i playing field leveled when you still have to worry about what is perceived the consumer an absence of quality in many american cars but i think so i think american cars have improved significantly in terms of quality and i think that's one point he's made that you were close with the sport but the

perception is still there and the japanese i think even though they're gonna hold back a market year is the sheer probably next there will be working very hard on the quality of the key really pushing research and go on and improve quality in models that are tailored more to american consumers so i think a lot of his rhetoric has been exaggerated exaggerated there's a grain of truth in it certainly gets easier to start a new plan with young workers enough to pay pension and medical little rest so they do have an advantage there but a few other plants here are very profitable i think they're willing to postpone profits whereas american companies or so that's not a level playing field but i think the top they're helping foreign protector become more competitive i think they're by example they're showing that the problem's not the american workforce nissan has the proms with the tennesseans were making the light trucks in

in the past few years here so is so it's not the american workforce boomers not those men were who were closer alliance a the old issue is an ross perot this week and then when i am like i go when they are lots and grow in the weeks and months of it still made it what about his assertion said simply fail to close well mike again i i talk primarily with with the japanese but my perception is the problem's been far more american problem the million properties and one thing you had a beer was made some mistakes but but but far fewer mistakes in thirty three minutes and i made that point how do you and how that as the qualitative

rises as the other bullet public perception of quality well will follow and that american cars particularly the japanese back away election year ago with a japanese fashion reduce the impact of inevitable that finally the game of catch up we'll work on our side i think it will that as long as the american victory don't raise their prices dramatically to match the japanese price i think it's the older prices at a reasonable level moody so that so that the american car american consumer an end in purchasing causes not simply looking at quality cost is a she major injuries and saturn is proving that is a major fact now explain this to me because it it it said it boggles my mind i know that japanese and many areas don't want american products on consumer shelf some less breaking down under pressure of bashing on the political pressure from abortion assertion good

deal of that is is is gradually beginning to crumble and that those areas are being beginning to fall but i also think there is something to the argument that american manufacturers do not understand the japanese market for the japanese tell us beyond that a japanese consumers and so the thought was that by rejecting america american products big question in my mind is and maybe are your conversations with japanese leaders gave some insiders how did they read our minds so well what was it about their ability to read the american consumers mind that we miss in trying to read the japanese consumers well they see her status

as the world's biggest market for the bcs i think they admire america think i think they're grateful the macarthur japan recover actual work to i think there's a lot of admiration for america i think the emulate us in a lot of ways i think that the whole damning management statistical quality control for us they took a lot of our ideas and just kept improving them on a bigger they're wonderfully skillful observers they come to united states and they listened and they hire americans that in the marital positions attend have by and large small egos were also good listeners and they use them put them up front and in doing the implementation of sort of their eyes and ears they bring back the ideas in the japanese are very skillful at taking an idea and just incrementally improving it step by step by step

they're taking the entrepreneurial calling the americans the two huge huge issue at marlins of and it was a tremendous volume of the judges or it has a small town so you would say that that the ball games on over that will love were still love where in india barely areas i think we're serving the millennials innings i think they won a co existed with everything they've been frightened by the breakup of the soviet union and the perception that we need an enemy in order to gather ourselves furniture allen really explain all this there's a recognition that some other politicians and indeed some of their industrious la where our kids a lazy our conservator in those are isolated pop off so i think those are isolated pop also i think what you see toy in the japanese government doing don't believe is the more reason to produce a sort of backing away giving a big tree a chance to gain regain some

market share probably nobody and knows the vision of the year of the year three big japanese american lawmakers take your of periscope peer into the future a decade and tell me where are big three will be easily their big three automakers i think toilet the year two thousand and two of the men wound from ford seems to be another of the american big three seems to be the company that's doing more things right right now gm because of its size i think certainly still be there and still be significant honda looks like a significant player in the nissan if it can nelson

lighter author of jumpstart as bauer guest on the word on where your hostess ben john sigg involved in this program was produced in the studios of wbez and nashville