KEY POINTS:
In Japan there is a deep-seated belief that "corporate life is life". Spending 60 hours or longer a week at work has long been a norm of Japan's male-dominated corporate life.
Long hours, however, do not mean high worker productivity. A recent survey asked Japanese executives what they most lacked. While 35 per cent said they needed more money or economic power, 60 per cent indicated that they were worn out. They needed more sleep, more stamina, more tenacity, more time and a greater sense of drive.
The Japanese Government has set up a task force to figure out how working hours can be effectively curbed as part of a campaign to boost productivity and encourage more women into corporate employment. And men to take a bigger parenting role.
Early signs, however, suggest that eradicating the old belief that long hours are an integral part of Japan's corporate success will be extremely difficult.
The resistance to change was explained with humour: "If you think lower work hours will be part of Japanese culture soon, you must be dreaming. And if you are dreaming, you are sleeping well. And if you are sleeping well, you are clearly not working enough!"
While change has been glacial in terms of advancing gender equality and work-life balance in Japan, awareness is slowly increasing of the positive flow-on economic benefits.
Recent work-life balance initiatives by the Japanese Government include the appointment of a Minister of State for Gender Equality and Social Affairs, campaigns to increase women's participation in the workforce, and changes in employment law to ban employers from using indirect forms of sexual discrimination.
For example, women doing clerical work were traditionally known as "shokuba no hana" or "office flowers", a reference to the belief that women had little to contribute beyond brightening up the office space.
In corporate Japan, it was expected that when a woman married she would leave her job to take on the more important role of "good wife and wise mother".
However, Japan's falling birth-rate and ageing population has resulted in a shrinking workforce. This has led to the start of an unprecedented and at times controversial political and public focus on gender equality issues, including the campaign to increase women's participation in the workforce while figuring out how (male) working hours can be effectively reduced and at the same time increase productivity.
Addressing a national conference on work-life balance recently, former Prime Minister Shinzo Abe stated that "working women will be the new source of strength behind this country".
Among others, New Zealand is being called on to showcase its progress in this area. It is a sign of the high regard that New Zealand continues to be held in internationally as a society introducing progressive social reforms.
Women's Affairs Minister Lianne Dalziel, Human Rights Equal Employment Opportunities Commissioner Judy McGregor and the Auckland Chamber of Commerce were asked to outline the New Zealand work-life balance initiative at a gender equality symposium in Tokyo last month.
The chamber's key message was about the benefit of making a commitment to change. Obviously, if New Zealand - or Japanese - employers continue to do what they have always done, the change needed will not occur.
On the other hand, if work and life practices mean that a business has an environment where people are positive about their work and stay - and are loyal and productive - they are more likely to keep customers happy and speak well of the business.
In an environment of skill shortages or when, increasingly, people with skills can choose where they work, employers will have to change. The change will not impose costs, it will deliver benefits.
Against Japan's long history of ingrained attitudes towards employment and work-life and gender equality issues, the return message from the visit to Tokyo is that New Zealand is a lucky country. We are young, more adaptive and flexible and less constrained by an ingrained cultural tradition.
Nowhere was this more evident in the brief Japan visit than the reaction to my story of how the New Zealand Defence Force - the winner of this year's Equal Employment Opportunities Trust diversity award - had in seven years redesigned and rebuilt its corporate culture to meet the demands of its changed role internationally and to enable women to participate, including in combat.
For the Defence Force, the change of role from masculinity and aggression to one requiring skills adept at conflict resolution, peacemaking and adapting to diverse environments quickly, called for a change of culture inside the organisation.
Likewise, the inclusion of women created the need for some attitude adjustment. All sectors of the armed forces worked through the issues of harassment and diversity to create an environment of respect and inclusion.
Women in the forces in the past who chose to have family responsibilities found - as in corporate Japan - they either left or had their careers limited. Today, as in many Kiwi businesses, with the introduction of childcare, recognition of school holidays and family flexibility, things have changed or are in the process of changing.
* Michael Barnett is chief executive of the Auckland Chamber of Commerce and chairman of the Equal Employment Opportunities Trust.
