I participated in one of four training courses held in March 1991 for new female high-school graduate recruits to Futajimaya. All three of these courses lasted six days, and were broadly identical - the reason for dividing these recruits into four groups was simply that the training centre was not large enough to hold all of them at the same time. Two other courses were also held: one for male high-school graduates, and one for graduates of tertiary education - mainly male, but also including six women.
Futajimaya offered me the choice of attending either the course for female high school graduates or the one for graduates of tertiary education. I chose the former because this type of recruit is in the m ajority in the Futajimaya group as a whole, and in 1991 provided six new seishain for the branch at which I was employed, as against two (one man and one woman) from the University graduates' course. I was told that the latter course differed mainly in th at the participants were considered as already more adult (shakaijin), and it was therefore not necessary to be as strict with them: "You just tell them to do something and they get on with it". Also, their higher level of education m eant that a faster pace was possible on the technical training side, particularly the p art involving arithm etical
calculations. The course for male high-school graduates has broadly the same content as that for their female counterparts, but is less popular with the trainers, who complain about the participants, wild behaviour -
particularly at night, when they tend to smuggle alcohol into the dormitories and get riotously drunk.7
7Drinking is illegal until age twenty in Japan, though everybody, company superiors included, tends to turn a blind eye as far as eighteen to twenty-year-olds are
concerned, as long as they do not get too out of control.
There were 120 participants on the course I attended, from all parts of Japan, stretching from Hokkaido in the north to Okinawa in the south. In addition there were six male trainers, who stayed for the entire course, and four female trainers, who arrived on the third day. The course took place in what could loosely be described as a distant suburb of Tokyo, although it is in fact in a different prefecture, in the company's own training centre, located about half an hour's walk from the nearest train station. It was opposite this station that the founder of Futajimaya opened his first store, back in the 1950s.
The trainees were all lodged in the training centre dormitories, as were four of the male trainers. Two of the male trainers stayed in a hotel near the station on a rota basis, a privilege to which they very much looked forward, as they complained that the dormitories were uncomfortable and overcrowded. Lack of space and a concern for my comfort were the reasons given for placing me in a hotel rather than the dormitory, and in fact I was unusually fortunate in having a very large and comfortable room to myself at the company's expense - the female trainers also stayed in a hotel, but had to share a room. For the sake of my research, I would have preferred to stay in the dormitory with the other trainees, but it did not seem possible to push this particular issue.
My status on the course was therefore somewhat peculiar - although I participated in all course activities on equal terms with the trainees, in generation and in the way I was treated I seemed to have more in common with the trainers. This ambiguity in my status worked against me in some ways, as the trainees tended either to avoid me or to treat me with
exaggerated respect, but on the other hand I was able to establish a good rapport with the trainers and thus, perhaps, to see the training process
from more than one point of view. I was also, unfortunately, unable to attend the first day of the training course - the company deemed this unnecessary as, according to the manager responsible, it only consisted of checking that everyone had turned up who was supposed to and giving them a medical examination. As with the question of dormitory
accommodation, I was in no position to insist. My account of the first day is therefore based on interviews with the training manager and with some of the trainees, as well as on my own observations of the first day of the subsequent course, which overlapped with the course I attended.
Day One
The trainees began to arrive in the late morning on the first day, all wearing smart suits, many in appropriately pastel colours for spring. The first task of the training staff was to check that all those registered to attend had arrived - often new recruits change their minds between accepting an offer of employment and the beginning of the training course. This time there were only three drop-outs, leaving 120 to attend the course. Since the trainees come from all over Japan they arrive slowly in twos and threes and there is a lot of hanging around in the ground floor canteen before the orientation meeting begins at 3.00 p.m. This is an opportunity for them to get to know each other, and also to size up
Futajimaya’s training centre, which in most cases seems to have made an unfavourable impression. One recruit told me much later:
When I arrived I was shocked, it was so dirty and shabby. I just wanted to go straight home again. Everybody felt the same way.
The orientation talk lasted about forty-five minutes, and concentrated on explaining to them how the course would be organised: the daily schedule, and rules to be observed during the course. All trainees are given a
timetable (see Appendix Two); a list of rules for the course (see Appendix Three); and company textbooks for new recruits, covering company history, philosophy and organisation, as well as dress and etiquette codes and more technical m atters such as gift-wrapping and basic calculations and paperwork. Following the orientation course the trainees were given a medical, and at 6.00 p.m. they had dinner in the centre's canteen. No
activities were scheduled for the evening, giving them time to settle in and get acquainted with their room mates in the dormitories before lights out at 11.30 p.m.
Dav Two
The next morning began with a wake-up call at 7.30, followed by breakfast. From now until the end of the course the pastel suits were put away, with all the trainees dressed in tracksuits, mostly the ones they used at high school. Roll call at 9.00, then a talk by the personnel manager at 9 .2 0 .1 arrived shortly before 10.00 a.m., and went straight to the lecture room, where everyone was waiting for the next talk, an introductory talk on the company, to begin. I have transcribed my first impressions, as recorded in my fieldnotes, below.
Training centre - shabby, grubby, dilapidated m odern building, located in equally shabby suburb/corner of urban sprawl spreading out from Tokyo. Very unimpressive. Quite far from the station.
Arrived shortly before 10.00 a.m., met by Mr Iwakura, went to sit in on talk. Murmurs of gaijintgaijin (foreigner, foreigner). People I sat next to immediately walked off...During the break after the talk most people flopped forward onto the benches, everyone looked very tired. Tried to engage the girl sitting next to me in conversation, but she was very monosyllabic. This is going to be an uphill struggle.
At the beginning of this introductory talk, and all the others for the rest of the course, the trainer giving the talk called on one trainee to lead the formal greetings. All the trainees had already been allocated to a branch, and were addressed for this purpose as X-san of Y branch. The designated
trainee then stood up, at the same time saying, "kiritsu, rei" (stand up, bow), while the other trainees stood up and bowed in unison, then ail
saying together "onegaishimasu" (please). The leader then said "chakuseki" (sit down), and everyone took their seats. The importance of correct
greetings was emphasised throughout the course, and in the introductory talk we were told th at greetings were the first thing we had to learn:"Even if you can't do anything else, you must be able to greet customers in a lively m anner with a smiling face".
Aside from stressing the importance of greetings, the trainer giving this talk was at pains to emphasise the change in the trainees' status from
gakusei (students) to shakaijin (adults, members of society). Here there
were clear parallels with Rohlen's account of the introductory talk at the bank training course he attended in which it was explained that:
Our aim is to build you up as people so you can grow on your own once you leave here. That's the reason we have tough (k ib ish ii) training. All of you are entering society for the first time.
Cooperative living is different from the kind of living you knew in your school days.
Your study here will also be different. In public schools, all you had to do was study for examinations. Whether you got along with your fellow classmates or not was not very important. Here, we have cooperative living as our style of life
(Rohlen 1974: 200-201)
On the Futajimaya course, we were told*.
Until now you have been students. Now you are members of society (shakaijin), and you receive a salary...But your life has changed in other ways too. Before, maybe you had your own room, or shared with just one or two brothers and sisters. Now you have to stay in a dormitory. There may be eight other people in the room...Here, it's group living.
As a corollary of this change, they were also told they would now have to be more responsible:
When you were at school, your teachers probably told you again and again to do something. Here you have three chances - we will only tell you twice.
Having made these basic points, the trainer moved on to give a brief outline of the Futajimaya group: its size; the scope of its business; the way in which Futajimaya, as a chain store, differs from the departm ent stores; and finally the "vision" of Futajimaya, and the company's mottoes. At the end of this talk, we were told that for the rest of the training, we would be divided up into six han, or squads, each comprising twenty trainees. Generally recruits destined for the same branch were all placed in the same han, and I was allocated to the h a n of the Hatakeda recruits. For videos and lectures we would continue to all gather together in the main lecture hall, but for the rem ainder of the course each h a n was allocated its own small room and trainer.
When the trainer had finished speaking, he again called on a trainee to lead the greetings, which followed the same pattern of standing up and bowing, this time with everyone saying in chorus, "Thank you very much". As soon as the trainer had left the room, most of the trainees flopped
forward onto their benches, apparently with the intention of using the twenty minute break for a quick nap.
After the break, lectures continued with two talks, the first on wages, health, and company welfare, and the second on a special Futajimaya in- house insurance scheme. By the end of the second talk, despite valiant efforts by the speaker to involve his audience through asking them
questions and cracking jokes, the trainees seemed to have had enough, and started fidgeting and chatting among themselves. The lunch break seemed to come as a relief to all concerned, and the trainees trooped off down to the
canteen, duly turning and bowing at those remaining in the room on their way out, and saying "shitsureishimasu" (excuse me), as course etiquette demanded. I was told to wait and have lunch later with the trainers.
After lunch we returned to the lecture hall for a video on "workplace manners" (including timekeeping and rules designed to prevent theft by employees) , and the correct appearance of Futajimaya's female employees - hair neatly tied back if long; discreet make-up; no jewellery except for one plain ring and a pair of small ear studs; uniform correctly buttoned; low shoes. Introducing this video the trainer again commented on the recruits' change of status from students to adults, but this time stressing the continuity between school and company life:
You might think rules are something from high school. Why am I working at a company if I still have to obey rules? But now you're getting a salary.
After the video, the appearance rules were gone over again, this time from the new entrants’ textbooks.^ The trainees read in turn from the textbook, mostly inaudibly, with many hesitations over the reading of Chinese characters, and periodic pauses when the trainer told them to underline some especially im portant point. On make-up, the trainer repeatedly rem inded them that Futajimaya is not a night club - make-up must be subdued. He also commented on their hair, which in most cases was long and loose, with many very long fringes in evidence. The main reason given for the strictness of the appearance code was that inappropriate make-up or jewellery might upset the "oba-san" (lit. auntie, used to refer to middle-aged women) customers.
**As well as the written text o f rules on appearance, the textbooks show pictures o f what a Futajimaya employee should look like, with detailed annotations. The picture o f a woman em ployee is reproduced in Appendix Four. This picture was prominently displayed in all the classrooms o f the training centre.
We then moved on to the next section of the textbook, covering an area described as "manners at work". The most im portant points here were timekeeping - "five minutes etiquette", i.e. you should always be five minutes early for everything (also included in the rules for the course), and the rule prohibiting bringing valuables to work. Both of these rules were justified in terms of trying not to inconvenience fellow employees:
If you bring valuables, or a large sum of money to work and it gets stolen it will cause bad feeling....If you are five minutes late back from lunch, and then the next person also takes an extra five minutes and so on, in the end the last person to go will have no lunch break left at all. So please think about the people you work with.
The distinction between work time and private time was also gone over here, with the trainer again pointing out that we get paid while we are at work, and it is therefore not the place to chat to friends about what we saw on television the previous night.
At this point the trainer broke off his talk, and, returning to the issue of appearance, abruptly told all of us to tie up our hair and remove our jewellery, "Now, immediately", and to keep it that way for the rest of the course. My fieldnotes record:
Incredulity from the audience as it sputtered reluctantly into life. Looked at each other, muttered, did nothing about it. All trainers lined up at front, two went down the room handing out black hair fasteners to those with long, loose hair, or showy hair fasteners. Very reluctant to comply on hair. Looked round, paused, finally mostly complied. Then checked by senior trainer, those who still hadn’t complied were told to.
Addressing the shocked, but now noticeably more awake, audience again, the trainer commented:
The difference between school rules and work rules is that if you break the rules at school you can get away with it, but at work you
can't. You see, the rules are stricter than they were at school. And you thought, I’m an adult (shakaijin), I'm free.9
After a short break, another video and lecture slot concluded the large group session for the day. The video dealt with appropriate facial
expressions, body language, and greetings when dealing with customers, first by showing how not to do it (film of a sullen, unsmiling sales assistant failing to greet an approaching customer, and then using abrupt and insufficiently formal language towards the customer), and then showing how it should be done. The correct way was then broken down, component by component, showing the correct smile; how to bow and what angles are appropriate to different situations; and the basic greetings to be used with customers. This video occasioned a lot of giggling in the audience,
particularly in the sections showing how not to deal with customers and the part where the sales assistant pulled up the com ers of her mouth to set her smile at the correct angle. As before, the lecture covered much the same ground as the video, but this time from the course textbook, with some additional elaborations, for example a gloss on the meaning of the
greetings used when a customer enters the store (these are standard throughout Japan):
On customer entering store:
Irasshaimase (lit. welcome) I'm grateful you chose this store
On customer leaving store:
Arigato gozaimashita (lit. thank you very much) Thank you very
much, the money you spend here pays my salary
By the end of this talk several people were snoozing, and a few were sound asleep - this is, apparently, common on these courses, Suzuki-san had
9The equation o f the status o f shakaijin with freedom is one made by the trainees, and is in conflict with that offered by the company. In noting this alternative construction o f adulthood the trainer is showing his awareness o f the existence of two conflicting definitions, and is challenging the construction placed on the term shakaijin by the new recruits.
warned me that the afternoon session on the first day had a lot of videos and was pretty boring, and said that I could slip out if I wanted to.
After another break, we broke up into our h a n and moved to one of the smaller upstairs classrooms for the last session of the day. This was devoted to games, giving the trainees a chance to relax a bit, but with the im portant underlying aim of encouraging them to get to know the other people in the
h a n and practise cooperating in groups. The trainer for our group was Mr
Uenoyama, a sporty looking man in his early thirties with a Yakuza style tight perm 10 and a brisk, but friendly and cheerful manner. Like all the male trainers, and the trainees themselves, he wore a tracksuit throughout the course.
First of all we had a name-memorising game, where we all had to learn each other's names, and then divided into smaller groups of five or six to