TOKYO (Reuters) - Leaders of Japan Inc. believe they have learnt a lesson from the global economic crisis -- namely that the U.S. business model with its eye on short-term gains has failed and it's time to return to longer-term strategies. Recent remarks by corporate chiefs from companies like Suzuki Motor Corp (7269.T) and Chugai Pharmaceutical Co (4519.T) underscore a desire of Japan's corporate leaders to reject pressure from what they see as short-term interests to concentrate on more sustainable returns. In one of the most public displays of the current corporate zeitgeist, Osamu Suzuki, who has steered Suzuki for the last 30 years published an essay in February rejecting what he saw as short-term interests tied to earnings. His views often attract attention, as analysts credit him for having turned his company into a globally-competitive carmaker by making inroads into India decades before it boomed, and expanding revenue more than tenfold. Arguing against calls from some securities analysts to depreciate the company's factories gradually so that near-term earnings would not suffer as much, Suzuki said the automaker's long-term interests were better served by writing down the cost quickly.
TOKYO (Reuters) - Leaders of Japan Inc. believe they have learnt a lesson from the global economic crisis -- namely that the U.S. business model with its eye on short-term gains has failed and it's time to return to longer-term strategies.
Recent remarks by corporate chiefs from companies like Suzuki Motor Corp (7269.T) and Chugai Pharmaceutical Co (4519.T) underscore a desire of Japan's corporate leaders to reject pressure from what they see as short-term interests to concentrate on more sustainable returns.
In one of the most public displays of the current corporate zeitgeist, Osamu Suzuki, who has steered Suzuki for the last 30 years published an essay in February rejecting what he saw as short-term interests tied to earnings.
His views often attract attention, as analysts credit him for having turned his company into a globally-competitive carmaker by making inroads into India decades before it boomed, and expanding revenue more than tenfold.
Arguing against calls from some securities analysts to depreciate the company's factories gradually so that near-term earnings would not suffer as much, Suzuki said the automaker's long-term interests were better served by writing down the cost quickly.
Risk and compliance managers should report to a non- executive director for "quality assurance," rather than to the executives they monitor, [Paul] Moore said. His idea was rejected yesterday in a preliminary government review of banks by former Bank of England director David Walker. Risk managers should report to both executives and non-executives, Walker said. "Joint reporting lines will never work," Moore said. "It will create an accountability crevasse in which responsibility and honesty will be lost." Four years after Moore sued HBOS, then Britain's biggest mortgage lender, for unfair dismissal, the cost of the bank's failed loans and investments is still mounting. A month after Lloyds TSB Group Plc bought the lender in a government-brokered takeover in January, HBOS posted a 7.5 billion-pound ($12.3 billion) loss for 2008. The value of the government's 14.5 billion-pound investment in the combined bank has dropped by 43 percent this year.... "Just at the moment when you're at your most blind, Mr. Chief Executive, is when you need somebody who can give you the opposite view," Moore said. Moore said he has presented his proposals to opposition Liberal Democrat Treasury spokesman Vince Cable, former Conservative Chancellor of the Exchequer Kenneth Clarke, Labour lawmaker John McFall, who led the House of Commons Treasury Committee's investigation into the banking crisis, as well as FSA officials he declined to identify.
Four years after Moore sued HBOS, then Britain's biggest mortgage lender, for unfair dismissal, the cost of the bank's failed loans and investments is still mounting. A month after Lloyds TSB Group Plc bought the lender in a government-brokered takeover in January, HBOS posted a 7.5 billion-pound ($12.3 billion) loss for 2008. The value of the government's 14.5 billion-pound investment in the combined bank has dropped by 43 percent this year....
"Just at the moment when you're at your most blind, Mr. Chief Executive, is when you need somebody who can give you the opposite view," Moore said.
Moore said he has presented his proposals to opposition Liberal Democrat Treasury spokesman Vince Cable, former Conservative Chancellor of the Exchequer Kenneth Clarke, Labour lawmaker John McFall, who led the House of Commons Treasury Committee's investigation into the banking crisis, as well as FSA officials he declined to identify.
