I don't think there is a need to go slightly less efficient in order to improve the current processes; they just got frozen in time and there are many such examples with companies and countries. Remember Japan is not the first time doing it, at the end of the shoguns era they were behind the rest of the world they were more advanced than.
There is always a dip in productivity when switching systems as you need to untrain people from the old and train them in the new system. Then you need to work out all the bugs and edge cases in the new system.
So even if it will make you far more efficient there will be a temporary productivity slump as people get adjusted to it.
