Japan's unwanted IT workers dumped in 'forcing-out rooms'

[antigop]

http://www.theregister.co.uk/2013/08/21/boredom_rooms_japan_electronics_firms/

Some of Japan’s biggest technology companies send certain employees to “boredom" or "forcing-out" rooms where they’re forced to undertake menial tasks designed to make them quit.

A New York Times report detailed the experience of 51-year-old Sony employee Shusaku Tani who refused to take early retirement after his position at the Sony Sendai Technology Center was eliminated.

With no job left for Tani and others like him at the firm, Sony decided to put them in an oidashibeya – which can be translated as “forcing-out room” or less accurately “boredom room”.

Here he apparently browses the web and reads books all day before preparing a daily report on his activities and leaving for home.

In other cases, skilled employees have apparently been forced to undertake data entry or repetitive assembly line work. The idea appears to be to make work so boring, uninspiring and shameful that the employee eventually gives in and resigns.

[GeorgeGist]

1. What's his DU member name?

Here he apparently browses the web and reads books all day before preparing a daily report on his activities and leaving for home.

[CreekDog]

4. !

[Fuddnik]

5. Makes Sense to me!

[westerebus]

6. So do the sock puppets around here get paid in Yen?

[PoliticAverse]

2. Browses the web and reads books all day - the horror!! n/t

[R. Daneel Olivaw]

3. Do you really find that funny? Perhaps I misunderstand.

Have you ever had a job that you were forced out of or demeaned to such a point that resigning was seen as a promotion?

Perhaps what you might not get is that these practices should all be illegal. Well paying jobs aren't always that easy to find, and when BehemothCo decides that you are expendable then they will do all sorts of mean-spirited things to make you quit so they don't have to pay a severance or at the very least give a decent referral.

I've both seen it happen to others, and I have experienced it first-hand.

[Hugin]

7. Proudly K&R'd from the comfort of my forcing-out-room.

I have no shame so I'm likely to be here for some time.

[seabeckind]

8. A friend and I have recurring theme along these lines

I don't think it is an unfaced corporate policy. To think so hides the actual villain behind a mask. Usually it is a person, one who has gained a position of authority and has the power to derail a potential threat to himself. Or someone who disagrees with his policies.

Of course his policies are for his personal long range plans. These people make decisions not because they are operating for the good of the company or the good of society. It is purely selfish.

And as these people proliferate within a company the company inevitably declines. Who was that man at Microsoft, not Gates, Allen, or Ballmer...the one who insisted that the O/S handle 3rd party elements? I can't remember his name.

Then there was the engineer at Boeing who warned that the company shouldn't outsource its core functions.

I wonder if there was such a man at Kodak who fought for digital photography but was overridden?

I wonder how much time these people spent in "forcing out" rooms?

I wonder if we looked inside failing companies we would find this condition? Or in our gov't? I know for definite that it is in our pentagon.

[seabeckind]

9. Addendum

After posting the above I started reading the comments in the register article. I was surprised to see so many that mirrored my opinion. I also noticed there were a lot that picked the opposite attitude -- that these people were not an asset to the company anymore and because of labor laws it was too difficult to get rid of them. Prompts the question: Who gets to decide?

I remember when DHS was being established after 9-11 that it had to be run without having to worry about those pesky provisions of the Civil Service Act. Or the labor laws...too restrictive to running the place like a bidness. Wisconsin?

A related opinion of mine is that I believe a lot of the reasons behind contracting out is that these rules don't enter into the operation. Makes it easier to treat people like a resource and not have to make the effort to find the best way to make the use of their individual talents.

I particularly liked the comment by anonymous coward in that article:

"The Japanese economy has had long periods of success with employment law which protected the workers so I can't see that the employment law is the problem."

Indeed. This is NOT the problem of these laws. It's a problem with the companies themselves! As I see the same corporate comments in other western countries (including the UK) with regards to suposedly high costs of production.

They're always looking for higher profits and cost-cutting measures instead of promoting in-house research, development AND production. Instead of being proud of being native and upholding high quality standards. Instead of being happy with the fact that they even make profit. It's a global problem stricken with ALL big corporations with greedy leadership with no regard for the common employees.

This happens everywhere in the world. Unfortunately the most developed countries suffer the most of this corporate greed. They need our engineering skills to invent stuff but soon as it is supposed to go in production then we are not important anymore.

The big question here is (as always): When is enough, enough?

Plus I hate it that they always explain away using the worst fallacies (energy-costs, labourcosts, resources etc...). It's about time some of these corporations go away! Its about time that WE say: produce in China?... then STAY in China! And keep your crap there!"

[Heywood J]

10. Allowing the outsourcing of jobs to countries that do not share a common set of labor standards

was one of the worst mistakes to make. I have no problem competing against the Germans, the English, the French, the Italians, the Swedes, or the Japanese, for example. They make enough money to live on (as opposed to subsistence), they have worker protections, and they aren't treated like dirt - it's a level playing field. I do have a problem competing against political prisoners forced to work at gunpoint, slave labor, child labor, disposable workers paid pennies per day, factories that have to install suicide nets, and the like.

[PassingFair]

11. That is better than the shit my company is pulling.

I am paid commission and salary. They are forcing me out thusly: Slash commission in HALF. Then hire more reps, but PAY THEM 150 to 200 $$ more PER WEEK salary than us. Apparently there is nothing I can do about this but quit. I farking HATE THIS PLACE.

[Taitertots]

12. That actually sounds like the best thing ever

Especially if I can do productive things at my own leisure.