I didn't feel like this article necessarily idolized it; the author seemed pretty even-handed about strengths and weaknesses.

The interesting question in all of these kinds of things is "are there ideas we can take to gain the strengths of other systems or patch the weaknesses in ours?". Looking at Japan specifically, I think I speak for most westerners in saying that if we could get a little more stability and less financial-quarter-driven behavior without taking the whole kit of lifetime employment and zombie companies, that would be a good thing. The author points out just how bundled that is, so it's a tough nut to crack.

One model that does give us that is the 'Untouchable visionary CEO' of Jobs and Musk, but I think the popularity of that approach is also limited, partially because of all the not so visionary CEOs trying to be Jobs, and partially because working for those guys is terrible. They inevitably seem to become tyrants.

Most Americans I know are familiar with the unending work culture of Japanese white collar workers (if only a parody version of it), and want no part of it.

Although from the perspective of most of the world, the US is also very work oriented. We also work some of the longest hours

Interestingly this article argues very strongly that you cannot have some of those things without taking all of them. That the various aspects of corporate culture reinforce each other and make performance worse if taken piecemeal.