The Day I Could No Longer Read the Same Book in the Same Way

I pulled out a book I bought about five years ago for the first time in a while.

It is "The Heart of Management" by Kazuo Inamori.

I certainly intended to read it seriously when I bought it. However, to be honest, I think my takeaway at the time was just, "I see, I suppose that is how it is."

It contains good things. It contains important things.
But if you ask me if those things reached deep into my heart, they probably did not.

The other day, I opened that book again for the first time in a long while.

Then, I found myself stopping at words that hadn't really caught my attention five years ago.

What is management?
What do managers look at, what do they value, and how do they face their company?

What was written there was very simple.
But to me now, that simplicity felt heavy.

It is the same book, and the same text.
The content written in it has not changed.

What changed was me, the reader.

I think that five years ago, I had not yet fully grasped what it meant to "manage" something with my own body as I do now.

Of course, I was working back then, too. I felt responsibility. I also had a desire to improve the office.

Even so, looking back now, I feel that somewhere along the line, I was still reading about management as "knowledge."

But now, it is different.

Hiring people.
Facing staff members.
Worrying about how to grow an organization.
Thinking about what we can provide to local business owners.
And the fact that my decisions affect the future of the company.

Once you start feeling these things every day, the same words read completely differently.

Words I once skimmed over now come straight at me.
Words I once read as "correct things" now turn into the question, "Am I really doing this?"

As I reread the book, I had that kind of sensation.

I was no longer able to read the same book in the same way.

This is not a story about how I have become better at reading books.

I believe it means that as a business owner, I have come to realize that I am still immature.

Things I did not understand five years ago, I understand a little better now.
However, the things I think I understand now might look different again if I were to reread them in five years.

Thinking about it that way, I believe that learning for a business owner is not something that ends after reading a book once.

Rereading the same book.
Encountering the same words once more.
Pausing where I previously just passed through.

I believe that is where my own growth manifests.

Lately, I have been constantly thinking about what kind of firm I want to make HIDAKI-KAIKEI in the future.

How should I nurture an organization of about 20 people?
What should we be to the local business owners?
Beyond just filing tax returns, how can we create an environment where business owners can continue to take on challenges?

The questions are increasing.
I do not have all the answers in sight.

That is precisely why I believe there is meaning in reading books I read long ago once again.

Chasing new information is important.
It is also necessary to go to new places, meet new people, and gain new knowledge.

But at the same time, I felt that it is also important to face the words I encountered in the past once again with my current self.

As my position as a business owner changes, the weight of the same words also changes.

There are things I could not grasp five years ago that I can grasp now.
And perhaps there are things I cannot grasp yet that my future self will be able to grasp in five years.

Thinking of it this way, I believe that management is not something where you find the answer once and finish, but rather something where you deepen yourself by returning to it again and again.

HIDAKI-KAIKEI is not yet a completed firm.
I myself am still in the middle of searching for answers.

Even so, I want to be a place where local business owners can return to their own origins, think, learn, and continue to take on challenges.

To that end, I believe that I myself must first continue to learn.

HIDAKI-KAIKEI will continue to organize numbers, create spaces for dialogue, and refine the business environment so that business owners can demonstrate true value and have that value properly communicated.

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