Blue Eyed Salaryman by Niall Murtagh
Niall Murtagh spent his twenties on the open road: hitchhiking to Istanbul, crossing the Atlantic in a home-built yacht and trekking through Patagonia. In 1986 he drifted to Japan where he made an extraordinary flip by settling down. He jumped in at the deep end and joined one of the most traditional and conservative companies in the East: Mitsubishi. He smiled when he read the company rulebook but stopped smiling when he realised the rules applied to him too. He was instructed not to walk around with his hands in his pockets, shown how to choose the correct place to sit at a meeting and given the words of the company song for studying after work. He learned the etiquette for offering and receiving business cards, the staff canteen rules (take one portion of vegetables, one portion of rice and finish eating by the time the bell rings) and the regulations for the company dormitories for new recruits (regular room checks, no noise, no females). His work impressed his bosses and he became a permanent employee - a lifer. In time, the corporate escalator moved upwards and he was promoted to manager class - the first westerner to reach such heights in the company inside Japan, they told him. He had realised the Japanese Dream: a traditional wife, a cosy apartment in the company housing block and a bicycle to get to work. He thought about moving on but when it came to saying sayonara, the time was never right. With his shiny suit, his attache case and a good dose of humour, Niall Murtagh describes a world that is an utter mystery to most westerners.
Murtagh gives a fascinating account of a system that is misunderstood, even satirised, in the West-- Iain Finlayson * Culture Vulture Books *
A fascinating and engaging book ... a rare inside look at corporate life in Japan, one that's worth more than a dozen business-school studies. -- Matthew Lynn * Bloomberg *
Full of wonderful vignettes and details. -- Harriet Sergeant * Spectator *
A fascinating and engaging book ... a rare inside look at corporate life in Japan, one that's worth more than a dozen business-school studies. -- Matthew Lynn * Bloomberg *
Full of wonderful vignettes and details. -- Harriet Sergeant * Spectator *
Niall Murtagh grew up in Dublin. After hitchhiking across Europe, Asia, Australia and Latin America in the 1980s, he settled down in Japan, first as a student, then as an ordinary employee of Mitsubishi. He has written for various publications, in both English and Japanese, on travel, technology and corporate culture. He works as a translator and lectures in Hosei University, Tokyo.
| SKU | Unavailable |
| ISBN 13 | 9781861977243 |
| ISBN 10 | 1861977247 |
| Title | Blue Eyed Salaryman |
| Author | Niall Murtagh |
| Condition | Unavailable |
| Binding Type | Hardback |
| Publisher | Profile Books Ltd |
| Year published | 2005-02-17 |
| Number of pages | 224 |
| Cover note | Book picture is for illustrative purposes only, actual binding, cover or edition may vary. |
| Note | Unavailable |