Feel the wind of new era, – to be proactive-

Under the COVID pandemic, many companies have been forced to experience a sort of change. Under the so-called VULCA world, we hardly expect what society would look like. However, Kyocera, over its 60 years of history, has successfully been launching new products, which respond to the demand of the new era.

From Inamori’s words, I would like to analyze what are the fundamental keys that allowed Kyocera to proactively develop themselves as a pioneer in various fields.

The keys are as follows.

Let me explain one by one.

1 Be aware of anxiety

“When you start up your new business, you must rely on only one product or service. Then you may think about what if the demand for this product dies in the market. In such a case, no one wants to have our product, what we should do. I had always worried about our product’s life, so I had to develop a new product. From the beginning, we felt that we are the ones who keep launching new products.”

→This is making the subliminal mind conscious. By explicitly expressing our anxieties or negative feelings, we can be aware of our fundamental feelings. If we ignore our feelings, those feelings may be embedded into our subliminal mind and govern our actions. Thus, Inamori carefully expressed his anxieties, share it with his staff. By doing this, he made his anxiety manageable.

Several mottos in Kyocera philosophy worked to deal with such negative feelings. For instance, “Believe in our infinite potential ”, “ The time to give up is the moment when our actual work starts. ”, “Assume our competency under -future progressive tense-”, all of them work for us to deal with our anxiety that we are aware of.

2 Devote us to our daily business-Carpe Diem-

“ Now I developed Kyocera, KDDI and successfully revitalized JAL. People admire what I achieved. However, the only thing that I feel proud of is devoting myself to the work given to me. In every single moment in my life, regardless of the size, impact, and significance, I have dedicated all my energies and spirits to complete the work in front of me. This attitude I call -striving ourselves much harder than anyone else-. ”

→ Now I have been involved in the building demolition work. With the company head, I explained our demolition work to our neighborhood. I believe this may give me a lot of hints to deal with the as-is issues in real estate. I am enjoying such a process and so enthusiastic to have hints for the new era.

3 Imagination oriented

“Japanese prefer taking a sort of bottom-up approach, while Westerns develop their imagination from the ideal product/ services. For us to reinforce our R&D, we may have to take the latter approach, imagination first, and think about how to achieve such goals.”

→ In real estate, either in development, master planning or valuation, analyzing the objects as if we were the head of the municipality where the property is located is very important. From the mayor’s viewpoint, we would be able to understand what the issues are, what kind of future we can see, and how to solve such issues. This approach allows us to proactively propose new planning as an external specialist.

4 Make the best use of “subliminal mind”

Inamori shared an episode. For one product, the R & D team spent about ten years and finally came up with a prototype, but they could not repeat its production. When Inamori asked the reason to the R & D head, he answered “It is impossible to produce this product, in the world, all the teams are about to give up, I don’t think we can develop. ” Inamori decided to change all the team members and move the project to another location, then inspired a new team with confidence. In six months, the new team succeeded in that product production, which the former team spent ten years on for R&D. Inamori said “As long as the leader believes it is impossible, the project will never ever succeed. The key is believing in ourselves, nothing other than that.”

→ This is a good example of how the subliminal works. The former leader felt some benefit in his remaining unsuccessful career.

His incompetency would never be revealed.

He may be welcomed with others, as long as he is looser.

He doesn’t have to face his weaknesses as a researcher.

All of them look beneficial as long as the project remains unsuccessful.

As the leader’s subliminal mind feels comfortable with unsuccessful conditions, the team never has never succeeded.

Thus, changing our mindset is significantly important.

5 Choose the riskiest but most exciting option

Looking back at what Inamori has done in his life, I can highlight the following accomplishments.

1 Remaining in a company which was about to go bankrupt.

2 Starting up a venture with a few staff.

3 Tapping a new telecommunication market to fight with the giant NTT.

4 Becoming a chairman of bankrupted JAL

5 Voluntarily supporting small to middle companies in Japan

Please put yourself in his shoes and ask yourself: would you take such an option if you were in Inamori’s position? Most of us would say NO. This is simply to avoid taking any risks. After World War II, so called baby boomers, we have been educated not to take any risks. Not to deviate from the so-called mainstream to be elites, we have been educated to share a similar value.

However, all of the above choices that Inamori made have been successful. He is the one who is fulfilled very much as a human. He has taken risks but most rewarded materially and mentally.

Thus, the following are the hints for us to get along with the new era.

Among the above, I feel that the no 2, chipping out our daily efforts and striving ourselves much harder than anyone else to complete the work in front of us is the most important for me. My former boss tells me “Carpe Diem”, all we must do today is to complete our work which appears in front of us. Get ourselves concentrated on that work regardless of its size and significance, we should put all of our energy to complete it. This is the attitude that helps us to feel the wind of a new era.

Further queries or doubts, please email to ytomizuka@abrilsjp.com

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