The Cutting Edge Japan Business Show Podcast Por Dr. Greg Story arte de portada

The Cutting Edge Japan Business Show

The Cutting Edge Japan Business Show

De: Dr. Greg Story
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For succeeding in business in Japan you need to know how to lead, sell and persuade. This is what we cover in the show. No matter what the issue you will get hints, information, experience and insights into securing the necessary solutions required. Everything in the show is based on real world perspectives, with a strong emphasis on offering practical steps you can take to succeed.copyright 2022 Economía Gestión Gestión y Liderazgo
Episodios
  • 370 Why New Salespeople Struggle In Japan – And How To Fix It

    370 Why New Salespeople Struggle In Japan – And How To Fix It
    Sep 28 2025
    Why New Salespeople Struggle New hires, whether they are brand-new to sales or just new to the company, almost always take time before they start delivering results. Yet leaders in Japan often expect immediate miracles. The reality is that ramp-up takes time, especially in a culture where relationships drive business. Even experienced people entering a new organisation need months to learn internal systems, client expectations, and industry nuances. When unrealistic expectations are placed on them from day one, they start their career already on the back foot. Mini Summary: Unrealistic day-one expectations ignore how sales in Japan actually work — relationships and systems take time to build. What Makes Recruitment So Expensive? Recruiting salespeople in Japan is costly, partly because talent is scarce. Agencies often charge fees of around 35–40% of the first year’s base salary. Add to that the salary itself — especially for English-speaking salespeople, who can command 20–30% higher compensation — and the initial outflow of money is massive. The problem is that while expenses flood out from day one, revenue from the new hire trickles in slowly. This creates enormous pressure on sales leaders, who then expect results too quickly. It becomes a vicious cycle: high cost, unrealistic demands, early disappointment. Mini Summary: With recruiting fees and salaries high, companies demand too much, too soon, from new sales hires. Why Superficial Training Fails Many firms assume salespeople “already know how to sell” and restrict onboarding to product knowledge. The new hire is shown the catalogue, given a few manager-accompanied visits, and then sent off to perform. But very few Japanese salespeople have ever received professional sales training. Most only get a thin slice of OJT — On the Job Training — and are left to figure the rest out. Without proper skills, they default to pitching randomly, relying on brochures and luck. Professional training, by contrast, teaches how to ask powerful questions, design solutions that match real needs, handle objections, and close the sale. A new hire with these skills instantly outperforms the average local salesperson who never learned them. Mini Summary: Superficial onboarding wastes money. Proper sales training equips new hires with skills that immediately lift performance. What’s Wrong with Sales Targets? Target-setting in Japan is often based more on fantasy than fact. Leaders pluck numbers from thin air, with no real data behind them, and then demand the newcomer hits them. For someone in their first year, these inflated targets crush confidence rather than inspire effort. In our firm, we took a different approach. We built a spreadsheet tracking each salesperson’s revenue quarter by quarter from their day one. By analysing averages, we could see what was truly realistic for year one, year two, and beyond. This gives a scientific base for setting expectations, avoiding the destructive guesswork that drives people away. Mini Summary: Data-driven targets build confidence and realism; fantasy numbers only drive frustration and turnover. Why Retention is the Real Battle Recruiting a salesperson is only half the job. Keeping them is the other half, and arguably the harder one. When we pile too much pressure on in the first year, many hires simply give up. The tragedy is that by then, they already have valuable product knowledge, client relationships, and maybe even professional training. Losing them means losing an investment of money, time, and credibility with clients. Worse still, some join competitors. I experienced this personally when a trained and client-connected hire quit and reappeared as our rival. That kind of loss stings and reminds us that retention must be protected at all costs. Mini Summary: Overpressure kills retention. Losing trained, connected hires means losing your investment — sometimes to competitors. So, What’s the Answer? The solution is not revolutionary, but it is often ignored. Start with science in target-setting. Support it with real, professional sales training. Layer encouragement on top so new hires believe they can succeed. The combination builds confidence, reduces turnover, and protects your investment. It also creates a reputation for stability and fairness in the marketplace. Clients notice when your team is consistent and reliable. New hires notice when they are supported rather than crushed. Everyone benefits. The methods are obvious, but the discipline to execute them consistently is what separates sustainable sales teams from revolving-door disasters. Mini Summary: Add science, add training, add encouragement — and you keep talent, protect investment, and win client trust.
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    11 m
  • 369 Corporate Ninjas of Concealment: How Leaders Lose Control

    369 Corporate Ninjas of Concealment: How Leaders Lose Control
    Sep 22 2025
    Why Japanese Corporate Scandals Keep Happening — And What Leaders Must Do To Prevent Them Why do corporate scandals keep repeating in Japan? Japan has been hit again and again by revelations of non-compliance — from Nissan’s faulty vehicle inspections in 2017 to Kobe Steel’s falsified data and beyond. In some cases, these practices stretched on for decades before discovery. On the surface, companies chase the mantra: “reduce costs, increase revenue.” The Board applauds, shareholders smile, and quarterly reports look sharp. But behind the curtain, corners are cut, compliance steps skipped, and procedures quietly subverted. Eventually, everything bursts onto the front page. Newspapers, evening newscasters, and magazines feast on the scandal for months. 👉 Answer Card: Compliance shortcuts always unravel — and in Japan the media monetises the fallout relentlessly. Why doesn’t leadership stop these failures? Executives often assume systems are working. They hope rules are followed. But hope is not a system. As Australians say after doing something incredibly foolish, often after a few drinks: “it seemed like a good idea at the time.” That sums up many Japanese compliance lapses. After the damage is done, leaders promise reforms, but the cycle repeats. 👉 Answer Card: Leaders who rely on assumptions, not verification, set themselves up for failure. Why is Japan a particularly tough environment for leaders? In Japan, the fear of failure is severe. Mistakes invite shame, career damage, even social ostracism. So employees hide them. They withhold information, they keep bosses in the dark, they become “corporate ninjas” skilled at concealment. The Nissan case made this visible. President Hiroto Saikawa asked why the misconduct wasn’t reported sooner. The answer? Workers believed that even if they spoke up, “the issue would not be resolved.” 👉 Answer Card: Cultural fear of failure in Japan fuels concealment, blinding leaders to reality. Can leaders ever really know what is happening? No leader can see everything. Once an organisation scales, personal control is lost. You cannot monitor every sales pitch or back-office process. By the time you know about a major failure, it is usually too late. But this does not mean surrender. It means shifting from blind trust to active verification. True leadership is not only about giving direction; it is about constantly checking what is really happening. 👉 Answer Card: Leaders must balance delegation with vigilance. What practical steps should leaders take? To prevent scandal, leaders need to act before the fire starts. Some proven steps: Talk to customers directly. Ask them about service, follow-up, and delivery quality.Talk to suppliers. They often know about problems before you do.Check the systems yourself. Do not rely on assumptions — test them.Audit workflows and quality processes. Do not stop at the financials. One client discovered they were paying $1,500 for a single social media post because no one verified the process. 👉 Answer Card: Regular audits and direct conversations uncover hidden risks before they become crises. Isn’t this too much work for executives already stretched thin? Yes, it takes more time. But prevention is cheaper than rescue. Executives of companies caught in compliance scandals are now overwhelmed with firefighting — holding press conferences, issuing apologies, and trying to salvage brand value. Imagine if half that time had been spent on prevention. 👉 Answer Card: Prevention consumes less time, money, and reputation than crisis management. Who is really in charge? On paper, it is the boss. In practice, culture, systems, and hidden behaviours often dictate outcomes. Leaders cannot control every lever — but they can insist on transparency, demand verification, and build prevention into the corporate DNA. 👉 Answer Card: Leaders are only in charge when they choose prevention over assumption. Next Steps for Leaders If you want to stay in charge: Stop assuming. Start verifying.Talk widely — with customers, suppliers, staff.Audit not just numbers but workflows and service quality.Treat prevention as leadership’s highest-value activity. Because in Japan, or anywhere, the truth is the same: hope is not a system. Prevention is.
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    12 m
  • 368 The Cure for Corporate Cancer: Rethinking Sales Outreach

    368 The Cure for Corporate Cancer: Rethinking Sales Outreach
    Sep 14 2025
    Let’s talk about sales, and why the new year always feels like a repeat performance. Greek myths rarely have happy endings. They are mostly cautionary tales, reminders of how the Gods treated humans like toys. One myth, in particular, perfectly captures the life of a salesperson: the story of Sisyphus. He was condemned to push a massive rock up a hill, only to watch it roll back down again, forever. That is exactly what we face in sales. We push that giant rock—the annual budget—up the hill every year. We grind, we hustle, we celebrate the results at year’s end, and then what happens? The rock rolls back to zero. Every January, or whenever your company decides the fiscal year begins, you stand at the bottom of the hill again, staring at the same heavy stone. And your sales manager will always say: “Don’t tell me about your last deal, tell me about your next deal.” That has been the universal sales manager mantra since the role was invented. The tension, pressure, uncertainty, and foreboding in sales never let up. Maybe you had a great year last year. You made President’s Club, you stood on stage at the convention, you pocketed a fat bonus. Congratulations—but so what? That was then. This year is a brand-new race. Or maybe last year was a disaster. You barely scraped by, you nearly got fired, and you made little money. Tough luck—but again, so what? That was then. This year, the rock is waiting, regardless. So, here is the real question: how are you going to roll that stone this year? Deals are always out there. The business exists. The only question is: will it come to you? If your strategy is to sit by the phone, hoping for an email enquiry to arrive or for marketing to deliver a steady stream of leads, then you are fooling yourself. That is not sales. That is passivity. And to be blunt, that is what the losers do. Winners know they must take action, not wait for lightning to strike. This is where Grant Cardone’s idea of the 10X Rule comes in. Grant is a sales trainer in the US, and his book has had a big influence on how we think. In our office, we even put a huge signboard on the wall: 10X Your Thoughts and Actions.Why? Because the truth is, most of us fall into the rhythm of rock rolling. We get used to small, incremental gains—classic kaizen thinking. Kaizen has its place, but let’s be honest: small steps will not vault us ahead of our rivals. They are also improving incrementally. If we want to leapfrog them, we must think exponentially. That is the essence of 10X thinking. The mindset that got you last year’s results will not take you much further. If we want to reach a higher level, we must break out of that cycle and think ten times bigger. And then, crucially, we must act ten times bigger. Genius ideas sitting in your head, unexecuted, are worthless. Of course, it sounds easy. For the first thirty seconds, it is easy. But then the discipline required to sustain it kicks in. And that is where most of us fall short. Sales managers have a critical role here: they need to drive this thinking every single day. That means looking at every angle of the rock-rolling exercise. Ask yourself: who bought from us recently? What similar companies have the same needs but do not yet know us? Why are we not calling them? Are we avoiding it because we are afraid of rejection? Do we think the low success rate makes the effort not worth it? If so, we are making excuses, not sales. Let’s flip the thinking. Imagine we had the cure for cancer. If your family or friends were suffering, would you be shy about picking up the phone to tell them? Of course not. You would feel an obligation to reach out. Well, our firms may not cure personal cancer, but they do cure corporate cancers—the inefficiencies, the gaps, the problems that drag companies down. If we do not believe that, then we should not even be in business. But if we do believe it, then there is no reason to hesitate in contacting companies who have not yet heard of us. We owe it to them to let them know we have the solution. This is how we overcome the fear of rejection. We remember that we are not intruding; we are helping. We are bringing the cure. And if we approach sales with that conviction, the fear evaporates. So, how do we put 10X into practice? Start with mindset, but do not stop there. Take massive action. Ten times the calls. Ten times the meetings. Ten times the follow-ups. Activity drives opportunity, and opportunity drives results. The more buyers we see, the more business we win. That is the math of sales. Yes, the rock rolled last year. It is rolling again this year. But we do not have to repeat the same tired rhythm. Let’s ask ourselves: how can we 10X every stage of this process? From the first call, to the first meeting, to the proposal, to the close. That is how we roll the stone not just up the hill, but higher than ever before. So, let’s do it. Let’s roll the rock 10X harder, 10X faster, and 10X ...
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    12 m
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