Understanding Japan from a Little Piece of Metal
The lapel pin is the symbol of Japanese corporate culture
When I joined a big American company, on the first day on the job I was handed a thick set of documents, the most important of which was the employee handbook.
The handbook included 50 pages of rules and procedures. At the very top was the rule that if I was caught with drugs or alcohol on company property, I’d be automatically terminated.
I understood the logic — besides the engineering and sales offices, we were a factory. And being under the influence of alcohol or drugs was dangerous when you were operating a 30 ton injection molding machine. Or a forklift.
But it also meant that if I went shopping before work and bought a bottle of wine and left it in my car together with the lettuce and tomatoes, if anyone found it I’d be fired. I really hate stupid rules.
Being young and rebellious, the next day I snuck a small bottle of whiskey into the office and left it in my desk. If I ever got angry and wanted to quit my job, all I had to do was take out the bottle and wave it around. Like Dorothy clicking her heels in the Wizard of Oz, I’d be magically stripped of my badge and transported off company property.
When I moved to Japan to work as a research engineer at a large steel company, on my first day I was handed a 5 page employee handbook which was mostly how to get a train pass, pay for the dormitory, and when to expect payroll. It was refreshing, even if it was all in Japanese.
The Japanese company, however, had one rule, and only one rule. It blew my mind.
Any time I was on company property or representing the company anywhere, I had to wear the company lapel pin. Not my employee badge. The company pin. If I even stepped onto company property without my pin, I was automatically fired. Wow! That’s what it said. For once, I’m not joking.
Clearly, this little pin was important. The HR manager handed it to me with the reverence of a police shield. While he watched, I attached it to the lapel of my jacket.
When I worked at General Motors and Honeywell, I’d never had a lapel pin. I’d always assumed the little cut in the lapel was for a carnation if I wanted to look fancy, or an American flag if I wanted to be an asshole.
In Japanese, the lapel pin is called 社章 (shashō) or 社員章(shain-shō) meaning company or employee insignia.
According to this article, the lapel pin was first used in Japan by the army during the Meiji era. Then it became popular as a school emblem for students. Only later did it become a company emblem worn by the public.
Taking the train home after work, I looked around. Most of the salarymen and salarywomen were sporting lapel pins.
Some were square. Most were diamond-shaped like mine. A small number were round. Some had kanji engraved. Most had a symbol of some sort. Unlike American pins and Olympic pins in bright enamel, almost all were shiny metal without color. I didn’t understand why they were they so important.
It took me years living in Japan before I truly understood the answer. Perhaps if I was an anthropologist or sociologist, it would have been obvious. But I was an engineer used to thinking in algorithms and equations.
What I finally realized is that when you join a company in Japan, it’s not just a job, it’s a family. There may be 20,000 employees, but they’re all your new brothers and sisters (mostly brothers, unfortunately.) In a way, it’s like joining the mafia or a gang. You still have your biological family, but the company is your tribe.
Gang members in the US sport tattoos of their gang insignia. That makes it easy for members to spot each other while showing off to the world. Japanese salarymen wear lapel pins. This one little symbol says, “This is who I am.”
This is why lifetime employment is so entrenched in Japan. People aren’t hired for their skills and experience. They’re adopted into a family. You’re brought in at birth (college graduation) and stay until death (retirement). You’re trained not to do a specific job but to be a team member.
While working for the company, you live in a company dormitory until marriage, then move to the company apartments. You work all day with your teammates, then go out drinking with them in the evenings. The weekends are filled with colleagues’ weddings, team picnics, or trips to the company resort in the mountains.
Shockingly for Westerners, spouses are not included. It was impossible for me to imagine attending a friend’s wedding without a plus one — a spouse or girlfriend or pretend girlfriend if I didn’t have anyone else. In Japan, there are no plus ones. Spouses have their own separate lives and aren’t invited. Our table at the wedding on Sunday was exactly the same as our row of desks during the week. This was a major mind shift for me.
Changing jobs in Japan wasn’t just moving from one office to another. It was leaving home. Joining another family. Being a traitor to your tribe. It was like switching loyalties from one gang to another, though without getting shot.
Japan is changing. Slowly. The lifetime employment system hasn’t melted away as it did in the US in the 1970’s. When American companies started laying off employees whenever there was a business downturn, Americans decided their job was a paycheck and nothing more.
Companies decided their only loyalty was to shareholders and owed nothing to employees. Employees reciprocated by switching jobs every few years whenever they got bored with their work, or hated their boss, or were offered a small raise to go elsewhere.
But in Japan, for many people, a job remains more than a job — it’s a way of life, and a way of thinking.
Back to that lapel pin. It’s not just a small piece of shiny metal. When I wore it on the train to and from the office, people immediately recognized it. They thought they knew me. Instead of seeing a White dude on the train, they saw a Kobe Steel man. (Though they assumed I was hired for the rugby team instead of the fluid dynamics lab.)
With the pin came the implicit responsibility to represent the company at all times. I wasn’t an individual who hates onions and loves writing; I was a face of everything the company stood for. Not just while I was in the office working, but at all times.
It’s telling that in America, the usual question strangers will ask is: “What do you do?” In Japan it’s, “Where do you work?” In the US, you’re a programmer, or a growth hacker, or a chief marketing officer. Where you work doesn’t matter. It’s likely to change soon anyway. You work for yourself.
In Japan, it’s the opposite. You work for Sony, or Hitachi, or Softbank. What you do doesn’t matter. It’ll probably change next April 1 anyway when you get transferred to your next assignment, from marketing to sales to corporate strategy. There’s almost no specialization.
Strangely, the corporate conformity didn’t feel stifling the way it did at big American companies. In the U.S., it felt like every year a new CEO hired from GE or Pepsi came in and decided what the company should stand for now.
HR gave us documents and rules and training programs created by lawyers to ensure we couldn’t sue the company. That felt like being put in a straightjacket and I had to rebel, even if it only meant stashing an unopened bottle of whiskey in my desk.
In Japan, it felt like I was accepted into a family. A family that would nurture me and take care of my every need. Even help me find a wife. (I did actually meet my wife at the company, though that’s another story.) And I was expected to identify myself with this family whenever I was out in public.
I could write a book on all the problems this tribal identification creates, starting with a lack of empowerment and a lack of opportunity for everyone who doesn’t fit into the rigid system.
I could also write a book on all the problems of the alternative where workers are paid for a job and let go as soon as the company finds someone else to work cheaper and good luck if you get sick.
Both have pros and cons. They’re different ways of thinking, and different ways of living. It takes getting used to.
Despite my non-conformist mentality, while working in Japan, I wore my lapel pin proudly. I did forget to put it on a few times, and I’m happy to report I wasn’t actually fired.
The day I left Japan and handed in my pin was sad. It felt like I was leaving my family behind. I was an outcast again, alone in a cold world. Though going back to school did give me a new tribal affiliation. (Go Bruins, beat SC!)
The lapel pin is slowly disappearing in Japan. Younger people may not wear a suit, and don’t bother with lapel pins. Even lifetime employment is gradually dying out as specialization becomes more important.
I won’t say that trend is bad, but there is something comforting about putting on the label pin each morning and knowing you’re among family.
