Development of Performance Appraisal Systems in Japan

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1) I had surveyed both practical literatures and research literatures published after the WW II to know how the performance appraisal systems were described and discussed. I found that many practical literatures had ever been published all years since the end of WW II, but research literatures had not been published about 20 years since the 1960s.The lack of research literatures seems to mean the lack of research itself, which may have been caused by the defects in industrial relations theory, prevailing research paradigm in that period.The research has been revived since the 1980s, although some researchers have insisted on the incorrect view that Japanese systems are very fair for employees without any evidences.2) I could reveal some important facts in the history of system development. Followings are some of examples.I found that we could suppose Matsumoto Matataro, professor at University of Tokyo, who introduced the system to Japan in 1920 for the first time, had been aquatinted with Walter D. Scott, pioneer of the system development in the US, because both had studied at Leipzig University in Germany from 1898 to 1990.I also revealed that Matsuda Taketaro, naval engineering officer, had played a very important role in the system introduction, because he carried out the fieldwork on performance appraisal system at a GE works in Massachusetts in the US around 1927-29, and introduced its system precisely duplicating of its appraisal foams in an engineering journal. He may have been the first person that applied the Japanese word "koka" to the English word "appraisal" in translation.