Lessons Learned From Comparing Survival Behaviors Of Very Old Japanese And American Companies

Abstract

This study compares small and medium-sized U.S. and Japanese companies that have been in business for at least 100 years, looking for common characteristics that enabled them to overcome environmental changes and economic challenges in order to prosper for an unusually long period of time.  Working with the premise that a fundamental objective of the corporation is to survive, this work is an attempt to identify common behaviors or strategies among the long-lived companies in different cultures that may be worth emulating.