The main business of the Mitsubishis in their formative years was shipping business. By 1876 their shipping division had already established as one of the biggest organizations, with the number of employees exceeding 1700 and many branch offices covering the whole country. Thus the company keenly felt the necessity of keeping constant communication among them and issued documents to clarify the structure of authority and communication so as to establish a systematic organization within itself.
This is why the Mitsubishis laid down “Mitsubishi Kisen Kaisha Kisoku” (Regulations of the Mitsubishi Steamship Co.), which was intended to systematize the inside operations of the company. But, in addition, there was another reason. At that time the Meiji Government intended to protect the shipping companies in which a systematic and open-system management including the modern accounting and reporting practices was realized. The Mitsubishis needed to work out such an organization in order to put themselves under the Government's protection.
After all, the Mitsubishis succeeded in building up an explicitly definited centralized departmental organization. This article is intended to trace the creation and development of this type of administrative structure which was significant not only in the development of the company but also in the more general growth of the modern enterprise in Japan.
