Visual communications – the Japanese experience

Abstract

Visual communications are defined and illustrated in their contemporary operations management setting. They manifest four distinct advantages: assimilation, exposure, evoking and unifying. In Japan, they are related to underlying inherent values and ensure employee involvement. The Japanese experience itself, with its consequent relative success in the field of visual communications, is both investigated and analysed as to type, functions and associated purposes. Visual communications are perceived as galvanising into company plans. Their potential and transferability to Western corporate cultures are explored with a view to their power to deliver information through the hierarchical organisational structure. The underlying thrust is towards achieving continuous improvement in communication, the impact of which would provide a better quality of work life for the employee and improve performance.