Unemployment for youth around the world is not just a problem in the middle east.  It also affects young people in the west including the U.S.  All the more reason, for us to invent jobs.

The images coming from the earthquake and Tsunami in Japan are heartbreaking. Like any culture, the Japanese culture has its advantages and disadvantages.  In this post I’m going to concentrate on the positive aspects.  Though we see great physical destruction in the images on television, what we do not see is also revealing and important.  What we do not see is looting.  Unlike natural disaster aftermaths in our country and others throughout the world, there does not seem to be looting going on.  Don’t get me wrong, Japan has crime and I’d be surprised if there are not some elements trying to take advantage of the catastrophe.  But I’m also sure that whatever negative elements there are, they are minimal.  As witnessed in the rise of quality improvement processes in Japan, the Japanese culture is one that is rooted in cooperation and teamwork.  That’s one of the reasons that quality concepts took off in Japan.  Working together is in the DNA.  What we are also seeing is selflessness.  There is sharing going on at a level most likely not seen in other cultures.  These societal elements will help Japan recover at rate that we’ve not seen in our country.  I predict we’ll see Japan rebuild their damaged areas before we see  New Orleans rebuilt. 

One of the reasons is that Japan is a homogenous society.  There is no racial bias contributing to allowing an area to languish.   The disadvantage of this closed society does not allow foreigners to deeply penetrate it.  Having said that, I’ve also seen outsiders do surprisingly well in building  businesses in Japan.  We often say that our country is the land of entrepreneurship, and it is.

I want to recount three instances of entrepreneurship by outsiders in Japan.  First is the case of a person, I will call D.  D grew up in southern California, the son of a white male and a Japanese woman.  After his  father died, his mother lamented the fact that non of her children spoke Japanese.  D decided he would go to Japan and immerse himself in one of the language courses.  He did so and learned the language.  Along the way, he became involved with a medical device distributor.  His drive and intelligence saw him take advantage of investment opportunities in his adopted country.  He quickly rose through the ranks of several companies.  What struck me about D was his willingness to invest in entrepreneurial opportunities.  He invested amounts that I was reluctant to invest in my environment.  Today, D is married to a Japanese woman and runs the entire southeast Asia operation of a billion dollar medical device company today. 

I’ll call my second friend, T.  T immigrated to Japan from another Asian country.  His engineering background and his inventiveness quickly drew the attention of Japanese hospitals and investors.  T built numerous medical businesses in Japan starting with nothing.  I once asked T what was the best way to learn to speak Japanese.  His answer was to marry a Japanese woman. 

The third friend I will call MT.  MT grew up in Japan and received an engineering degree.  He started a commercial businesses based on his design of electronics and control devices.  His company quickly became one of the fastest growing businesses in Japan, a feat that is rarely achieved for companies that are not part of an established business network. 

My message is twofold.  First, as I encourage in my  “11 building blocks of success,” my friends built their businesses from the ground up in a society where this is more difficult than in our own.   Second, the culture of teamwork and the growing spirit of entrepreneurship in Japan will assure that it rebuilds and continues to prosper.

All of this should offer encouragement to my readers who are considering taking the plunge and building their own businesses outside the U.S. corporate environment.

It's discouraging to look at the political discourse in our country, and the media's concentration on so many things that are not important to our future.  I hardly watch the media news shows any more.  They are more interested in sensational news creation than reporting what is going on.  We have many challenges and our focus needs to be on these challenges.  We seem to be unable to face the big challenges.  The foundation building block in my 11 building block of success is the avoidance of teleophobia.  We can't be afraid to begin tackling a problem even though we may not have the detailed plan as to how to succeed.  We must have confidence that as long as we know what we want to do, or what problem we want to solve, we can figure out how to solve it or how to do it  To that end I thought the following column from the NY Times about tackling our infrastructure was worth reading.  Here it is:

March 11, 2011

The Master Key

By BOB HERBERT

The United States is not racked with the turmoil that is shaking the Arab world, or the tragic devastation that has hit Japan. We are not in a state of emergency. We’re in a moment when it is possible to look thoughtfully at the American landscape and take rational steps to ensure a better, more sustainable future.

But we’re not doing that. The big news out of Washington this week was Representative Peter King’s Muslim witch hunt. Policy makers at all levels of government are talking austerity — sometimes sensibly, but most often mindlessly. Creative ideas regarding energy, education, jobs and so forth have trouble even getting a hearing.

Now comes Senator John Kerry hoping to buck the frustrating tide with a modest proposal. He mentioned in a speech in January that through most of its history America could build things — not just manufacture goods, but build the infrastructure that is required for a nation to be great: “We built a transcontinental railroad. We built an interstate highway system. We built the rockets that let us explore the farthest edge of the solar system and beyond.”

But that time has passed, and it’s not an overstatement to say that unless we atone for our infrastructure sins the high tide of American greatness will have passed as well. How is it, for example, that we don’t already have in place the infrastructure policies to support the vast potential of the green energy market, projected to surpass $2 trillion by the end of this decade?

It’s an investment opportunity not to be missed. But somehow the United States is missing it. “Two years ago,” said Senator Kerry, “China accounted for just 5 percent of the world’s solar panel production. Now it boasts the world’s largest solar panel manufacturing industry, exporting about 95 percent of its production to other countries, including the United States. We invented the technology, but China is reaping the rewards.”

It would cost the United States a staggering amount to get its overall infrastructure into decent shape — the best recent estimate is $2.2 trillion over the next five years. Without substantial investments, we’re in danger of being overwhelmed by an enormous range of problems, including ever-longer commutes, an inadequate energy grid, difficulties getting commercial products to market, breakdowns in essential communications and the loss of industries, investments and jobs to competitors overseas.

The investments are essential, but where is the money to finance them?

Senator Kerry will introduce legislation next week to create a federal infrastructure bank — officially, the American Infrastructure Financing Authority — to provide loans and loan guarantees to large, essential infrastructure projects. The loans will be seed money used to leverage other sources of funding.

“These are strictly loans — not grants — for commercially viable projects,” the senator said. “The federal government does no more than 50 percent of the loan. We expect that to leverage $600 billion or so in infrastructure investments over time.”

Mr. Kerry said the initial cost to the government would be $10 billion. Other proposals to establish an infrastructure bank have been more ambitious and more expensive. Senator Kerry is anticipating — or, at least, hoping for — bipartisan support and a nod from the Obama administration for this more modest initiative.

We’ve moved so far from that forward-looking, can-do philosophy of prior eras that there is a danger that we really are incapable of preventing the nation’s infrastructure from deteriorating further. We’ve seen how catastrophic that can be. New Orleans was all but lost for want of an adequate system of levees and floodwalls. Thirteen people were killed in the rush-hour collapse of the I-35W bridge over the Mississippi River in Minneapolis. Natural gas pipelines are blowing up in city after city. And the sorry condition of so many streets and highways contributes, at least in part, to the deaths of thousands of motorists every year.

Creation of an infrastructure bank would be an important indication that leaders in Washington are still capable, despite most of the available evidence, of moving beyond partisan paralysis to engage one of the biggest challenges facing the country. If there is such a thing as a master key to a better American future, investment in the nation’s infrastructure would be it. That is the biggest potential source of jobs. That is how you build the foundation for new and innovative industries.

I sometimes try to imagine New York City without its subways, or the United States without the interstate highway system. Those kinds of projects could not be built today. Try to imagine life in the 21st century without the Internet. Imagine if we had never gone to the moon.

Maybe that’s what’s missing today. The ability to imagine.

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One of the building blocks of success is understanding who you are.  That's always been difficult for African Americans as discussed in this blog posted on the Huffington Post:

Robin Quivers

Posted: March 3, 2011 09:51 AM

The Real Black History

I'm watching African American Lives on PBS, a documentary featuring the ancestry of prominent African Americans. The show features famous entertainers like Chris Rock and Tina Turner and prominent business and community leaders. Usually, when people look up their ancestors it's a happy occasion to learn where you came from and who you're related too. This is not so if you were born black in America.

I found out just how hard it is to figure out who your ancestors are last year when I looked up my grandfather on my father's side. It was so exciting to see his name in the government records, stating who he was married to and listing all of his children including my dad. My excitement was short lived, however, because that one census entry was all I found.

There was nothing at all before that one entry; it was as if he came from nowhere and suddenly appeared as a grown man with children. Watching African American Lives, I discovered why. Until after the Civil War, blacks weren't listed in the census because they were were slaves -- property. To learn anything about slaves, you have to examine property records, and even then you won't find names -- you'll find descriptions. We were listed with the cows, mules, pigs, chickens and other livestock.

It's in these records that we discover the true horror of slavery. We see how black people were valued, how they were sold and bought, how families were either preserved or broken up depending on the whim of an owner or circumstances. If an owner needed money, selling a slave was a way of getting some ready cash. Slaves were passed down in wills. The documentary also reveals the history of race mixing and asks the question, was every incident of race mixing under slavery rape? It also asks, what effect has this history had on the African American community today?

Seeing such accomplished people reduced to tears by discovering the fragments of their past tells me that the impact is great, even today. I was both fascinated and saddened watching the unraveling of these ancient documents and listening to the fates of these people. It was not about how hard they had to work or how they might have suffered physical hardship; it was about the emotional toll exacted by being treated like chattel.

This is what should be talked about during Black History Month. It's of little importance that George Washington Carver discovered hundreds of ways to use the peanut. What's amazing is that he managed to get the opportunity to have any freedom of self expression at all. The resilience of the human spirit it took for him to become a scientist is astonishing, and that's what is truly to be celebrated. As Chris Rock says during the special, it's amazing that any of us has managed to do anything at all given our history.

Next time you're enjoying that discussion with friends about where you come from, just remember that most African Americans have no answer to that question. And even if you ask them, realize that you're generally asking which state their family comes from -- not which country.

It's this history that needs to be remembered each February because it's a testament to the human spirit that African Americans survived and even thrived in post Civil War America even in the face of incredible discrimination, threat of harm and denial of opportunity. This is the legacy that should be proclaimed, celebrated and honored. It's a heritage to take pride in, and one that every African American child should be proud to carry on into the bright future our ancestors struggled to create for us.