RITUAL IN JAPANESE COMPANY: THE CASE OF ASAKAI

Abstract

Poor communication is a serious problem for an organization. Based on its culture, each company has to find a strategy to improve the quality of organizational communication. This research sought to investigate how a Japanese company with their culture strived to resolve and prevent poor communication problem in the organization as represented in aritual, called ASAKAI.The research also focuses on how the local employees react to this ritual which is different than that of Indonesian companies. Qualitative data were collected by observation of practice and face to face interview that were conducted in PT. TMMIN, particularly Engineering Division. The findings revealed that ASAKAI has animportant role to improve and maintain the quality of organizational communication. The local employees also assumeand believe that ASAKAI is a good activity and no employees stand against it. The perceived conflict occured not because of the cultural difference, but because of the person whom are leading the ASAKAI.