German named CEO of medical company Olympus

Might want do that job "remotely" if you know what I mean. Video meetings are your friend.

Hope he don't caught himself in any scandal, at least he consult with Michael Woodford before taking that position. Also might to train himself proper bowing, even sometimes is not useful for foreigner only for Japanese.

He’d better keep at home a big music instruments case…

Run mate run.

Ultimately, Japanese don’t take kindly to foreigners having positions of power in their country. Something bad is coming to this guy, mark my words.

I highly recommend Michael Woodford’s book all about the Olympus scandal, and the disgusting way he was treated. He only avoided the same fate as Ghosn because he notified the Financial Times of the story before the Japanese authorities could nab him on made-up charges.

At that time, Woodford's case was seen as an example of how Japanese companies had a hard time dealing with foreign managers

Yes, isn’t it a pain when foreign managers pick up on years of accounting falsifications and cooking the books? Pesky foreigners. Why can’t they just ignore these things like a good Japanese manager would do?

A career in putting his head in lion's mouth at a circus would be less riskier.

hope he's not too efficient for his own good!

Ship him in, have him cut salaries and staff, longer working hours, harder work, pay him well for it, ship him back to Germany and blame the evil foreigner for the social crisis.

Japan don’t worry, he will be detained for an inordinate time, after trying to pull the company into normal global practices. Once done then learning his lesson he his free to flee. I’d have a letter of apology ready for the prosecutors.

I hope he has 3 passports to neutral countries.

I highly recommend Michael Woodford’s book all about the Olympus scandal, and the disgusting way he was treated. He only avoided the same fate as Ghosn because he notified the Financial Times of the story before the Japanese authorities could nab him on made-up charges.

If you're a Unification Church member, a Chinese/Vietnamese communist, and any wealthy elite of ASEAN/India, then Japan can't simply touch.

Japan's xenophobic elites have a double standard for discriminating against foreigners. Japan allows Chinese elites and Southeast Asian elites to snap up real estate assets across Japan, while it prohibits Renault from completely taking over Nissan and Mitsubishi Motors.

If he was smart then he will work from Germany on have executive and investor meetings online and surround himself with people he can trust to insulate himself. Also, I would check to see what problems and scandals are coming down the pipeline soon. There may be something wrong with the company already that the J- executives would not mind letting a "foreigner" be the patsy for.

He should definitely do his research and not let greed or ambition get in the way of making the right decision about taking this position.

If not, it won't be too long before conniving Japanese executives will collude with the J-gov AGAIN to frame him or make up some trump up charges to kick him out the company because he has served his purpose.

As King Arthur so eloquently put it in the film, "Monty Python and the Holy Grail", run away run away!

to make sure he gets support in what he called “any cultural roles.”

Looks like he has already been briefed about "our culture". It excuses most corruption.

It's sad. But I'd advise against any non-Japanese becoming the face of a Japanese company. Too many people have been burned in the past.

Best case scenario: They merely use him to be the gaijin frontman for all the restructuring, downsizing and clearing out of the corporate deadwood that needs to be done if Olympus is to be restored to profitability. Then the J-elites get to avoid the social backlash by the average Tanaka and everything can be blamed on the cruel foreigner.

Worst case scenario: He ends up becoming the fall guy like Ghosn and Woodford did.

Was still expecting that the microscope division would recover and keep making the excellent instruments they always have, even under new leadership, but for good or for bad I just read they sold that whole unit and will focus only on medical equipment.

Olympus microscopes which I used when I was a microscopist were one of the best.

sensing they hired a foreign scapegoat to pin decades of scandals and fraud on.

once known for old-style photographic cameras

That makes me feel old. I remember buying my first Olympus camera when it was considered new-style.

Again there seems to be a lot of people opposed to the general tenor of comments here but who are providing no supporting case. I'd love to hear from people who believe a foreign CEO is going to be treated fairly.

 They merely use him to be the gaijin frontman for all the restructuring, downsizing and clearing out of the corporate deadwood that needs to be done if Olympus is to be restored to profitability.

Restored to profitability? This sentence alone tells me how out of touch you are lol. Olympus is doing outstandingly well for more than a couple of years now if you ask me. It's restructuring is complete(done by a Japanese CEO) and is only focused on growth right now.