Hi all. Hope you can give me some ideas on my thoughts here.
I'm an electrical engineer in New Zealand. My job for the last few years has been servicing lifts (elevators) and escalators. Obviously we have a massive interest in safety. I'd actually say safety is 99% of my job.
One of our techs just came back from 6 months in Japan doing the same job.. and boy was he unhappy with working there. Not the country or the people at all. More that in doing the same job as he does here he said he got pressured a lot to, in his words "make things work smoothly". IE if something was broken on a lift, like a door switch, bypass it so nobody would perceive that it was broken or out of service.
Door switches are a critical safety system. It's a super big thing to bypass a safety system. It's a criminal offense here and (and Japan too from what I've read). There have been quite a few noted elevator related injuries in Japan because of bypassed safety switches. Here if I was asked to bypass a switch, or compromise safety in any way I'd just tell my employer no.. And if they insisted I'd probably reply with very colorful language.
I'd like to hear some opinions from any professional engineers in Japan whether that kind of experience is typical or a random outlier. Having never traveled there or worked there I have no idea if my impression is somewhat based in reality or totally incorrect. Does it work to say to your boss 'it's broken' or 'no I won't do that'?
I hope this doesn't come off the wrong way. I'm a bit ignorant of Japan work life and want to learn.
by cheetor5923
8 comments
A search for “Toyota safety certification” will tell you all you need to know about the topic. But then other countries aren’t really any better (you can verify this with a search for “VW emissions tests”)
The tricky thing about Japan is while most people have a moral compass, it’s often challenged by the social order of things in society, especially in business–most notably major Japanese companies. Employees either take the initiative or get orders from above to skirt the rules, lie, or manipulate data for a number of reasons, but it’s about maintaining an image of perfection and or mitigating any new and potentially (financially) risky work, which would result in the company in losing face to the public.
Funny, there are lot of scandals in Japan, but they seem to easily be swept under the rug with a good ‘ole deep bow at a press conference.
Now you got me paranoid about elevators in Japan.
Kinda dangerous to do that, if someone gets hurt in all likelihood his boss would disavow all knowledge and hang him out to dry. One of the perils of working in a foreign country is that you tend to be more vulnerable and unscrupulous operators will take advantage of that.
I’m not an engineer so I can’t comment on that, but I’d like to believe that the majority are adhering to safety standards cos, morality aside, the blowback if something did happen would be much worse. However, I feel like the elevators here are also different (more dangerous) than the ones back home to begin with, so I’m not sure what the deal is on elevator safety in general.
This is not actually related to your question, but thought it might be interesting if you didn’t already know…
Most of the elevators here (unless they’re very new maybe?) don’t have a laser sensor, and the “safety” works off a long vertical pressure sensor type part that sticks out a little through one of the doors. When pushed in, the door stays open/reopens.
A lot of elevators here also close quite quickly (as in time between the doors opening and then closing automatically) – the one for my apartment building allows approximately one and a half people (moving at a normal person speed) to exit before closing automatically. You have to use the “open” button or press in the safety part to prevent it from hitting people. The pressure sensor in the door is not very sensitive so usually the door has smacked you relatively hard before it reopens.
Japanese tend to hide bad things under the carpet. Tend to do what the boss told them to do and will fix the figures so it’ll look good.
There have been several automobile inspections with results tempered and got caught only to be repeated again. There also have been companies re-using expired ingredients. If something happens once, there a large chance of happening again because people don’t change that fast.
Unfortunately, it’s the lower guys who ends up taking the blame. There still secretaries of politicians who commit suicide to cover up for the boss.
That said, it doesn’t apply to all. Trains are on time and there not too many train nor airplane accidents. I haven’t heard of any elevator accident either. So, something seems to be working here and have to say, safety here isn’t too bad from what I see.
I can’t comment about electrical engineering, but I worked sales at a manufacturing plant between 1997 and 2007. We had some clients from Italy visit and they were horrified when they saw our machinery. Apparently, the norm there was transparent covers over everything that moved. Our machines had zilch.
Engineer here who has worked in Japan. Yes, I have seen multiple times test results were “made to work”. It’s quite rampant really everywhere, but most people have this expectation that Japan is somehow above doing that.
It’s usually better to say.
People’s lives are at stake.
Which company are you with? I’ll report it in the public interest instead.