Titled "The Japan That Can Say No," the book finds fault with American corporations for their short-term mentality and their failure to develop a tradition of quality manufacturing.

These are the dangerous side-effects of the short-term mentality.

This problem of transient ownership is compounded by the short-term mentality of institutional investment managers.

In fairness to institutional investors and corporate managers, they are not the only ones afflicted by this short-term mentality.

At the same time, private contractors with a short-term, for-profit mentality have taken over many tasks once performed by officials.

Senator Kassebaum suggests that institutional investment managers have a "short-term mentality" toward portfolio investment, partly because they are "increasingly hired and fired on the basis of their quarterly performance."

In fact, Mr. Hazy does far less business with American carriers, which he says have a short-term mentality, than international ones, with whom he has built long-term relationships.

Once the market's short-term mentality switches to outright bullishness, he envisages trouble for stock prices.

Instead, he gets to the core of the problem by pointing out the dangerous side effects of the short-term mentality brought about by almost exclusive use of financial performance indicators in monitoring the health of complex businesses.

The trick is to take advantage of their short-term mentality, she answered her critics.