It's hard to imagine how much courage it takes for a corporate executive like Michael Woodford to blow the whistle on his company, Olympus, in the face of Japanese business culture.

Reuters reports:

TOKYO (Reuters) - The ex-CEO of Japan's disgraced Olympus Corp attended what he called a tense but civilized board meeting on Friday with the directors who had sacked him, and said all hoped the firm could avoid being delisted over the scandal engulfing it.

But Michael Woodford, still an Olympus director despite being fired as CEO a month ago and blowing the whistle over the accounting scam, said there had been no talk of him returning to lead a clean-up of the once-proud maker of cameras and endoscopes.

Olympus had fired Woodford, a rare foreign CEO in Japan, alleging he had failed to adapt to Japanese culture and the company's management style. Woodford says he was axed for questioning dubious merger and acquisition payments.