Listened to this mildly built man’s presentation at EA-Tokyo seminar. This was first introduced in the newsletter I subscribe.
Since I read Japan.inc every month, I was looking for some funny anecdotes regarding his experience in Japan. There were very few of them but nevertheless it more than justified the time and fee.
Most of the comments were not far away from conventional wisdom – probably I can put together the advises written in those best-selling business books and fabricate the same kind of talk. But when those seemingly old formula comes out of the mouth of a person who had gone through all the rough roads, suddenly it was as if I was Mose listening to the ten commandments from God… What makes a person’s stories convincing and original is whether that person tested them by himself. I felt I can actually see the aura coming out of his body.
Some comments from him:
“There won’t be any recovery in the current recession, the reason is simple – Japan is getting old and there will be fewer people. Recent stock price surge is just a dead-cat bounce, from what I see”
“Entrepreneurship is not for everybody – you have to be truly obsessed and fabricate your life and work. Have you heard of any great painters who called it a day because the clock shows it’s six o’clock? – if you do not have that enthusiasm then you should stop thinking about it. But when you succeed, it will go out of your wildest dream and totally change the way you look at the world”
“Is Japan changing – yes, but the gap is also widening. Media doesn’t tell but people are starting to change out of desperate”
Encouraging stories for individuals, depressing stories for the whole – like every other comments on our situation.