Van Etten v. Mitsui, 09-cv-1071, brought in Federal Court in Manhattan, alleges that the Japanese company practice of installing a "glass ceiling" above which only Japanese may rise constitutes an unlawful practice of discrimination. [Download the complaint..]
“Mitsui USA and Mitsui Japan have a strict policy requiring that the top positions and virtually any position managing personnel at the company be filled by the all Japanese/Asian staff,” according to the complaint.
Japanese routinely informed me, working in Tokyo and Osaka in the 1980s, that no Gaijin would ever be permitted to manage a Japanese. One Englishman, fluent in Japanese with Japanese wife, had spent 20 years with a major local securities firm. He was promoted to Senior Manager of his department with its one direct report-- himself.
Only within the past 10 years has this taboo been broken in Japan. In 2005, Sony, where I once worked, appointed Howard Stringer as top dog, raising hackles throughout the rank and file. And Sony is regarded within Japan as a company which routinely breaks new ground in HR practices.
However, this suit alleges a glass ceiling in Japanese companies operating in the U.S. Sad to say, I have no recent personal experience directly on point here, i.e. in the U.S.. But, it is, at first glance, an entirely believable claim, based on strongly-held cultural ideas and traditional practices.
Is the executive management of Mitsui and its subsidiaries in the U.S. entirely Japanese? Does the plaintiff speak Japanese? How will the plaintiff prove an unspoken rule -- a silent convention, as it were -- that may no longer be applicable in Japanese companies in the United States? Let's keep an eye on this one.
