The United States has Condoleezza Rice and former high-profile CEO Carly Fiorina, China has Vice Premier Wu Yi and steel magnate Xie Qihua, and Japan has ... Kazuko Hosoki, a celebrity fortune teller. Ask Japanese to name the most powerful woman in the land, and Hosoki, a well-known TV personality, is more likely to crop up than politicians or executives, a reflection of the rarity of women in Japan's corridors of power.
Lately, though, women executives see signs that change is finally afoot, driven in part by the demographic imperative of Japan's ageing population and a shrinking labour force.
"Companies have to be serious about promoting women because it's good business sense," said Merle Aiko Okawara, chief executive of frozen-food maker JC Comsa Corp.
"If they face a diminishing population, they must prepare now by increasing the number of women and training them to be managers," said Okawara, a Japanese-American who has battled in Japan's male-dominated business world for four decades.
Pressure on corporations to appeal to a broader, savvier range of investors and customers is also fomenting change.
"Even men who don't agree with the concept of gender equality are thinking they have to mobilise women," said Kaori Sasaki, who runs her own communications consultancy.
"Before it was just PR, but now it's seen as being linked to raising corporate share prices and sales," Sasaki said in an interview at her company's offices, situated in a chic Tokyo shopping area.
Statistics show vast room for improvement.
Japan ranked 38th in a recent gender equality survey by the World Economic Forum, behind both China at 33rd and the United States at 17th. Nordic countries topped the list.
A 1985 Equal Employment Opportunity Law forced Japanese firms at least to pay lip service to gender equality on the job.
Successful female role models, though, are still rare, and juggling work and home remains a huge challenge for women given that their spouses typically work long hours and shun housework and childcare.
"Companies have created a framework to hire women and make it easier for them to keep working after having children, but nothing has changed for men," Sasaki said.
Earlier this year, two troubled Japanese companies grabbed headlines when they tapped women to lead corporate makeovers.
Fumiko Hayashi, 58, former president of BMW's Tokyo operations, took over as chairman and CEO of supermarket chain Daiei Inc on May 27, and former TV news anchor Tomoyo Nonaka is to be approved for the top post at Sanyo Electric Co Ltd this month.
Businesswomen applaud the moves, but some wonder whether the two have been set up to take the blame if restructuring fails.
"I think they might become mere scapegoats," said Kazuko Okuma, who heads How Corp, a public relations firm that has 14 employees -- all women.
Few were surprised that both executives were company outsiders, given a shortage of women in the top ranks of Japanese industry, where they hold a mere 2.8 percent of managerial posts.
A desire to fill that gap has prompted some big companies to set targets for increasing the number of female managers.
In a nod to female clout when it comes to buying cars, Nissan Motor said in February it would boost its percentage of women managers to 5 percent by March 2008 from 1.6 percent now.
Consumer electronics maker Sharp set similar targets earlier this month.
The message that neglect of female talent stymies economic growth and corporate prospects is starting to get through.
"Considering the tough global competitiveness facing their companies, it could be a fatal misjudgement or even a national-level loss (for Japanese executives) not to make the most of the abilities of female employees," the Nihon Keizai Shimbun business daily said in a recent commentary.
For now, however, many women agree that the bigger the company, the more impenetrable the barriers.
"The glass ceiling exists for those who want to work their way up in large corporations," JC Comsa's Okawara said. "So those with confidence and who want to be on our own leave corporations and found our own companies."
Women in business are more optimistic but see a long way to go.
"The gender issue is on the table in society. That's a good step," said Yukiko Yoshimaru, Nissan's general manager for diversity development.
So what's changed least in the past 20 years? Yoshimaru replied with a sad smile: "The mindset of Japanese gentlemen."
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