I read ‘Keep Asking Until You Break Through: The Trajectory of Struggles, Efforts, and Growth of Giant Startup Visional’ by Satoshi Ebitani, so I’ll introduce the insights I gained from the book.

Background: I Am Who I Am Today Thanks to the Grassroots Venture Method

“Thanks to the grassroots venture at BizReach and LUXA, Tokyo Otaku Mode started with the grassroots venture method, and I was able to experience various things, which made me who I am today.” With this in mind, I read this book to gain insights.

Below are quotes and notes from impressive passages.

Chapter 1: Giant Startup IPO - Change is the Condition for Survival

"Do valuable things the right way" is Minami's catchphrase and has also become Visional's value. "Since we only live once, if we're going to work on something, we want to create services that make family, friends, and employees think 'I'm glad this existed'"

Japanese: 「価値あることを、正しくやろう」というのが南の口癖であり、そのままビジョナルのバリューにもなっている。 「一度きりの人生、せっかく何かに取り組むなら、家族や友人、社員たちに『あってよかった』と思ってもらえるサービスをつくりたい」

Chapter 2: Lessons from Rakuten Eagles - Mikitani, Shimada, and Ozawa

"Listen, successful businesses and thriving ventures always have reasons. Start by finding out what those reasons are. Research thoroughly, dig deep, and find the essence." The starting point of business creation is finding the essence of the problems you want to solve. How quickly and accurately you can find this determines the success or failure of your business. For this purpose, Ozawa frequently used the term "element decomposition."

Japanese: 「いいか、うまくいっているビジネス、成功している事業には必ず理由がある。それが何か探り当てることから始めろ。徹底的に調べて掘り下げて、その本質を見つけ出せ」 事業づくりの出発点は、自分が解決したい課題の本質を見つけることからだ。それをいかに早く、的確に探り当てられるかが事業の成否を決める。そのために小澤は「要素分解」という言葉を頻繁に使った。

? Element decomposition of problems

"Why does this problem still exist?"

“I don’t want to know your ideas. I want to know why this problem still exists. What you’re thinking has already been thought of by tens of thousands of people. So why does this problem still exist unsolved? Thoroughly decompose the industry structure and history into elements.”

Japanese: 「なぜ、この課題がまだ存在しているんだ」

「俺が知りたいのはお前のアイデアではない。なぜ、この課題がまだ存在しているのかということだ。お前が考えていることなんて、既に何万人もが考えている。それなのに、なぜ今もその課題が解決されずに存在しているのか。業界の構造や歴史を徹底的に要素分解しろ」

? Element decomposition of why problems remain unsolved

"If any effort can't be put into a spreadsheet and considered, it's meaningless. If you can't measure the results of your hard work, you don't know what you're working hard for. Think of a way to measure everything."

Japanese: 「どんな取り組みも、スプレッドシートに落として考えられなかったら意味がない。頑張った結果を測定できなければ、何のために努力しているのか分からない。とにかく測定できる方法を考えてみる」

? Think of ways to measure any effort.

Chapter 3: BizReach Founding - Opportunities Seen by Outsiders

(1) Find problems that trigger your own problem awareness (pull the trigger) (2) Thoroughly research and decompose problems into elements to identify the essence (find the center pin) (3) Think of essential problem-solving methods and express them in concise words or numbers (determine the launch angle)

Japanese: (1) 自分の問題意識に引っかかる課題を見つける（トリガーを引く） (2) 課題を徹底的に調べて要素分解をし、本質を見極める（センターピンを見つける） (3) 本質的な課題解決の方法を考えて端的な言葉や数字で表現する（打ち出し角度を決める）

? Framework for asking questions

Takeuchi's influence on Minami in management was also significant. Since founding, Minami has made it a management rule that more than half of the directors other than himself are people with engineering or product management experience. He believes that in internet companies, people who understand engineering and product development should be involved in major decision-making.

Japanese: 経営においても、竹内が南に与えた影響は大きい。創業以来、南は自分以外の取締役の過半数を、エンジニアやプロダクトマネジメントの経験のある人材が占めることを経営のルールとしている。インターネット企業なら、大きな意思決定の場に、エンジニアリングやプロダクト開発のことが分かる人間が関わるべきだと考えているからだ。

? For internet companies, I want more than half of the directors to have engineering backgrounds.

Chapter 4: Building Organizations with Logic and Winning Habits - Work on People's Consciousness

・Interviews rather than job interviews ・Hiring is a matter of probability ・Management top commitment is essential

Japanese: ・面接より面談 ・採用は確率論 ・経営トップのコミットが不可欠

? Hiring points

"I thought I was building trust with my subordinates by going out drinking with them a lot. But the moment performance dropped, employees quit. All my previous efforts were almost meaningless. So managers should think about nothing but improving performance."

Japanese: 「自分は部下とたくさん飲みに行って、信頼関係を構築しているつもりだった。だが業績が下がった瞬間に社員は辞めていく。それまでの努力はほとんど意味がない。だから、経営者は業績を伸ばすこと以外は考えない方がいい」

? Managers should only think about improving performance.

Chapter 5: The Impact of TV Commercials - Do It Until You Break Through

So Soichiro Minami had no choice but to find allies among his grassroots venture friends outside the company and refine the concept, just as he did when he started BizReach.

Japanese: そこで南壮一郎は仕方なく、ビズリーチを始めたときと同じように、社外の草ベンチャー仲間の中から同士を見つけ出し、コンセプトを練り上げていった。

? The founding members of Tokyo Otaku Mode were involved in LUXA’s grassroots venture, so I’ve been greatly influenced by the grassroots venture approach.

Minami: Looking back now, I think it was quite a reckless decision even for myself, and I'd like to introduce the founding members of BizReach and the grassroots venture friends who gathered with us, as well as the founding members of LUXA who helped grow the launched service as a company, because they made it possible for the company to get on track afterward.

While starting BizReach, what I tried to start mainly with another grassroots venture was “LUXA.” Thankfully, it grew to a company of about 150 people in 4 years, and aiming for further growth, it became a subsidiary of KDDI last year.

Actually, those who helped launch LUXA were Tomohide Kamei and Takuya Akiyama from Tokyo Otaku Mode, who were working at major companies at the time. I was really happy to hear that they later started Tokyo Otaku Mode using the grassroots venture method.

Japanese: 南：今思うと、かなり無謀な判断だと自分でさえも思いますし、ビズリーチの創業メンバーと集まってくれた草ベンチャーの仲間たち、また立ち上げたサービスを会社として育ててくれたLUXAの創業メンバーのおかげで、その後会社として軌道に乗りましたのでご紹介させてください。

ビズリーチを起業しながら、別の草ベンチャーを中心に始めようとしたのが、「LUXA」でした。ありがたいことに4年で150人くらいの会社にまで成長して、さらなる成長を目指して、去年、 KDDIの子会社になりました。

実はLUXAの立ち上げを手伝ってくれたのが、当時、大手企業に勤めていたTokyo Otaku Modeの亀井智英さんとか秋山卓哉さんとかでした。そのあとに彼らがTokyo Otaku Modeを草ベンチャー方式で始めたとお聞きして、本当にうれしかったです。

Source: 起業や転職に踏み切る前に—ビズリーチ南氏による”草ベンチャー”の勧め - ログミーBiz

Chapter 6: After BizReach - Setbacks as the Source of Evolution

They introduced a company system within the company, dividing it into two: the "Career Company" that oversees BizReach business and the "Incubation Company" that handles new businesses.

Japanese: 社内にカンパニー制を導入し、ビズリーチ事業を統括する「キャリアカンパニー」と、新事業を担う「インキュベーションカンパニー」の二つに分けたのである。

? The BizReach method for growing companies

When Minami consulted about delegation of authority at a meeting, Fujita said: "If you're going to separate, ultimately it's better to physically separate offices so you don't see each other's faces daily. No matter how much you think you're delegating management, if you see each other at the company every day, as a founder you'll definitely want to interfere."

Japanese: 当時、ある会合で南が権限移譲について相談すると、藤田はこう言った。 「離れるなら、究極的にはオフィスを物理的に分けて、日ごろは顔を合わせない形にした方がいい。どんなに経営を任せると思っていても、毎日会社で顔を合わせていれば、創業者としては絶対に口を挟みたくなるから」

? For full remote work organizations, this would be splitting Slack workspaces.

Chapter 8: Conditions for Being a Chosen Company - Business is a Promise to Employees

Even though they recognize the importance of hiring, most managers don't take the lead themselves to make it happen. Among CEOs of companies with over 1000 employees, there are probably very few who prioritize and secure time for talent acquisition on a daily basis.

Japanese: 採用の大切さを認識していても、経営者の多くは自分から先頭に立ってそれを実現したりはしない。 1000人超の会社のトップで、今も日常的に人材採用の時間を優先して確保する人は、ほとんどいないのではないだろうか。

? I want to continue recognizing the importance of hiring and actively practice it.

"When you can hire one management talent, the business and organization grow dramatically. Bringing people who you think are more excellent than yourself into the company is the shortcut to growth. Finding and inviting such talent is what I think is the most important job of a manager."

Japanese: 「経営人材を一人採用できると、事業や組織が飛躍的に成長する。自分よりも優秀だと思う人を会社に迎え入れることが成長への近道。そうした人材を見つけて招き入れることが、経営者の一番の仕事だと思っている」

? It’s the duty of managers to hire people more excellent than themselves.

There it was written: 1, 3, 1, 3, 1, 3, 1. He added zeros to rewrite it as 1, 3, 10, 30, 100, 300, 1000. "Listen, organizations always have walls when they exceed 1 and 3. When organizational hierarchies increase, problems often occur, so be especially careful."

Japanese: そこには、1、3、1、3、1、3、1、と書かれてある。そこにゼロを加え、1、3、10、30、100、300、1000と書き換えていった。 「いいか、組織は1と3を超えるときに必ず壁がある。組織の階層が増えるタイミングは往々にして何かしらの問題が起きるから、特に気をつけろ」

? Organizational walls when exceeding 1 and 3

That’s all from the Gemba.