The 37th annual Japan-United States Business Conference is being held this week at the Hotel Okura. Top business executives from the two nations who comprise separate, compatible organizations are spending three days discussing important issues that concern commerce between the two most important economies in the world.
This is not just casual chitchat over cocktails. The session has attracted the very top of the U.S. business community -- CEOs of the biggest U.S. corporations that do business in Japan. They have come to meet their counterparts -- the CEOs of Japan's top international companies -- for a hard-nosed discussion on how to improve business and political relations between the two nations. This week's discussions will culminate a process of consideration of issues that began last November and have been staffed extensively since that time. Now the top brass are sitting down privately to make decisions on how to make progress on issues that affect the business of both nations and the world.
Under the current leaders, Minoru Makihara of Mitsubishi Corp. and Michael Armstrong of ATT, the business councils have become more action oriented. They reflect the nature of modern business -- stressing action and progress rather than simple consideration of problems.