At Nippon Sheet Glass, local flavor is good, slang is bad

As an American about to become CEO of a Japanese company, Craig Naylor is a rarity.

Later this month when he assumes the helm of Nippon Sheet Glass Co. — a big maker of sheet glass for the auto and construction industries — he'll become one of a handful of foreign chiefs of Japanese firms. His peers include Howard Stringer of Sony Corp. and Carlos Ghosn at Nissan Motor Co.

In a rare move in Japan, where lifetime employment and seniority-based hierarchy is the norm, Nippon Sheet Glass conducted an external CEO search and chose Naylor after eight months, wooing the 61-year-old out of retirement after a long career at DuPont Co., according to a June 7 article in The Wall Street Journal.