Hōrensō means spinach. It is also made of the first syllables of three workplace words: hōkoku (report), renraku (inform) and sōdan (consult).
Around 1982, Yamazaki Tomiji, president of Yamatane Securities, started a “spinach campaign” in his company. His book on it, Hōrensō ga kaisha o tsuyoku suru (Spinach Makes a Company Strong), appeared in 1986. One account says the idea came from his father.
On a Toyota assembly line, a worker who notices a problem activates the andon and calls a supervisor. If the problem can be fixed on the spot, the line keeps running. If not, the line stops at a set position.
The system rests on three conditions. A worker can call. When someone calls, a person always comes. The person who called is not blamed.
Japanese railway workers point at a signal and call out what they see. The practice, shisa koshō, began with steam locomotive drivers of Japanese National Railways who checked signals this way.
In 1994, the Railway Technical Research Institute tested it. Without pointing or calling, the error rate was 2.38 percent. With both, it was 0.38 percent, about one sixth.
Players whose teams lose at the national high school baseball tournament at Kōshien often scoop up dirt from the field to take home. No official record shows who began the custom.
One account credits Kawakami Tetsuharu, whose school was runner-up in 1937, although he reportedly denied it later. Another credits Fukushima Kazuo of Kokura, who lost a quarterfinal in 1949. He found dirt in his uniform pocket and had no memory of taking it.
Many Japanese school grounds have a statue of a boy who carries firewood on his back and reads a book as he walks. He is Ninomiya Kinjirō, later known as Ninomiya Sontoku.
The first such statue at a school was put up in 1924 in Toyohashi. In the 1930s and 1940s, schools across the country followed. Many statues were taken for their metal during the Second World War.
A kaikinshō is an award for never missing a day of school or work. Many Japanese schools still give it. Few absences also help in recommendation-based admission to high schools and universities.
A Newsweek Japan article linked this culture to karōshi and suicide from overwork.
Otsukaresama (お疲れ様): an expression that acknowledges another person’s effort. At work, it is also said to a colleague who leaves before others. It can be said to colleagues and to superiors.
Isshōkenmei (一生懸命): with all one’s might. It grew out of the older isshokenmei (一所懸命), which described a medieval warrior who staked his life on a single landholding.
A verse attributed to the tea master Sen no Rikyū reads: Kiku sahō mamori tsukushite yaburu tomo hanaruru tote mo moto o wasuru na. Keep the rules and forms completely. Even when breaking them, even when leaving them, do not forget the root.
The verse is linked to shuhari, the stages of learning a traditional art. Shu is holding to the basics. Ha is adapting them. Ri is developing one’s own way.
In 2000, it became known that Mitsubishi Motors had hidden defect reports from customers and repaired vehicles in secret.
On January 10, 2002, a wheel came off a Mitsubishi truck in Yokohama and struck a mother and her two children. The mother, 29, died. The company blamed poor maintenance. In March 2004, it withdrew that explanation and announced a recall. In April 2004, police arrested seven former top executives of Mitsubishi Motors and Mitsubishi Fuso.
NHK’s morning drama Oshin ran for one year from April 1983. Its heroine is born into a poor farming family in 1901 and sent away to work as a servant at the age of seven. She endures harsh treatment and loses a son in the war. In the end, she builds a successful business.
The series averaged a rating of 52.6 percent and peaked at 62.9 percent. No Japanese drama has matched that peak.