Letter J

Japanese Style of Management: The Japanese style of management has various distinctive elements:
• a long term perspective, in which establishing a strong market position is more important than short-term profit.
• a highly educated, highly trained workforce that is encouraged and empowered to improve production methods and quality;
• lean production, eliminating wastage of materials and time;
• continuous improvement
• decision making by consensus.

(See Kaizen, Kanban, Lean Thinking, Mckinsey 7S framework)

Joint Venture: A joint venture involves two or more parties coming together to undertake an economic activity. The parties typically agree to create a new entity together by jointly contributing equity capital and share the revenues and expenses. The venture can be for one specific project only, or for a continuing business relationship. Multinationals often enter emerging markets by forming joint ventures. Such an arrangement not only helps them to benefit from the expertise of the local partner in managing the local environment but also minimizes risk, especially political risk.
(See Political Risk, Strategic Alliance)
Judo Strategy: A term coined by David Yoffie of Harvard Business School. Judo strategy effectively means avoiding direct confrontation and leveraging the strength of the opponent to create space. Judo strategy can help small companies to enter new markets and defeat stronger rivals. Through speed, flexibility, and leverage, new players can occupy uncontested ground and turn the strengths of dominant players against them.
Consider Netscape, which after being set up in 1994, became the hottest company in the tech world. Netscape’s flagship product, the Navigator Web browser, dominated its market from day one. And in August 1995, just sixteen months after its founding, Netscape made a highly successful IPO. But Netscape’s fall was equally spectacular when it decided in favor of a head-to-head confrontation with Microsoft. In late 1995, Microsoft launched aggressive moves against Netscape. Under relentless attack, Navigator’s market share soon began an irreversible decline. By the end of the decade, Microsoft had started to dominate the browser business, and Netscape survived only as a division of AOL. In contrast, Palm Computing which shipped the Pilot, a handheld electronic organizer, in April 1996, succeeded for much longer by avoiding head-to-head battles with entrenched leaders.
In many competitive battles, the answer is not to oppose strength with strength, as Netscape ultimately chose to do. Instead, the challenger should study the competition carefully, avoid head-to-head battles and use the opponents' strength to its advantage. This is the essence of judo strategy.
Challengers can be at a severe disadvantage when entering a market where a powerful incumbent holds sway. Judo strategy can come in handy in such circumstances.
Just–in-Time : See Lean Manufacturing