The Future of Accompaniment Support: Toward a Social Infrastructure for Building Better Companies
So far, based on the growth driver theory, I have organized the concepts and processes of accompaniment support for business owners who aim to build better companies.
Accompaniment support is not about providing answers on behalf of the business owner.
Nor is it about imposing a correct answer from the outside and forcing execution according to a plan.
It is support that stays close to the process as the business owner examines the state of their company, puts their uncertainties into words, organizes the logic of their decisions, and moves the company forward little by little.
It is support that walks alongside that process.
In this article, I will consider the direction in which this accompaniment support is heading.
In conclusion, accompaniment support needs to transition from a stage that relies on individual goodwill and capability to a stage where it is positioned as a social mechanism.
Of course, the humanity, experience, and sincerity of each individual supporter are indispensable to accompaniment support.
The ability to listen carefully to the business owner's story.
The ability to wait for the business owner's own thinking rather than providing immediate answers.
The attitude of trying to see the connections deep within the company, rather than just its surface.
These are essential for accompaniment support.
However, relying solely on these will not allow support to spread.
Reproducibility will not be created.
The quality of support will not be stable either.
What is required from now on is accompaniment support that stays close to the business owner's uncertainties while looking at the connections of the entire company to support the building of a better company.
And at the same time, it is a perspective on how to nurture, support, and connect the people who provide that accompaniment support.
To root accompaniment support in society, supporting the business owner is not enough.
The accompaniment supporters themselves who support the business owners also need to continue learning, be supported, and grow.
Accompaniment support is not flashy support.
It is not support that boasts of short-term results.
However, it should become an important social infrastructure that changes the quality of a business owner's decisions, changes the way a company exists, and underpins the regional economy.
■ Why is accompaniment support socially required?
Many small and medium-sized business owners think, "I want to make this a good company."
I want to cherish my employees.
I want to keep the company going for a long time.
I want to please my customers.
I want to contribute to the region.
I want to leave a slightly better company for the next generation.
There are by no means few business owners who have such thoughts.
However, having the desire and actually being able to change the company are different things.
In reality, business owners make decisions under many constraints.
Anxiety over sales.
Labor shortages.
An aging workforce.
The struggle of not being able to develop young talent.
A disconnect with management.
Resistance from the front lines.
Cash flow issues.
Customer service challenges.
Issues involving family or successors.
These things are intricately intertwined.
Because of this, even if business owners know in their heads that they 'should change,' they often find it difficult to take action.
For example, they may face the following dilemmas:
'I want to delegate to my employees, but if I do, quality might drop.'
'I want my management team to think more, but if I push them too hard, our relationship might suffer.'
'I want to introduce new systems, but it might cause confusion on the front lines.'
'I want to instill our philosophy, but it might sound like empty platitudes.'
'I want to raise wages, but I don't know if our profits can sustain it.'
This is not mere indecisiveness.
It is not laziness, either.
It is a state where the business owner is unconsciously sensing the breadth of the potential impact within the company.
One decision affects another area.
If you change a system, the employees' perception changes.
If the employees' perception changes, their behavior changes.
If their behavior changes, it affects customer service and operational quality.
As a result, the state of the entire company changes.
Management is conducted within these kinds of interactions.
That is precisely why business owners cannot move easily.
In fact, the difficulty of management lies in the very fact that one cannot move easily.
In the Growth Driver Theory, we do not view such stagnation merely as a 'problem,' but understand it as a 'structure.'
The president, management philosophy and vision, business model, systemization and standardization, and the behavioral environment.
What state are these drivers in, and how do they influence each other?
Where is the bottleneck, and where should we start moving things?
We look at the company from that perspective.
However, what is important is not to force a specific theory onto the business owner.
What is important is to treat the business owner's hesitation not as a personal weakness, but to understand it within the context of the company's overall connections.
It is to support the business owner in understanding their company's state more deeply and making decisions in their own words.
This is the reason why hands-on support is needed.
Business owners do not just want advice.
They do not just want to be told the correct answer.
They need support to look at their company's situation together, organize their uncertainties, and regain their own sense of judgment.
Accompaniment support is support for that purpose.
■ Challenges Facing Support from Government and Financial Institutions
In recent years, the term "accompaniment support" has also come to be used by government and financial institutions.
Regular interviews.
Following up on business plans.
Support for utilizing subsidies.
Formulation of business improvement plans.
Monitoring of figures.
Confirmation of cash flow.
These are all important initiatives.
Especially for small and medium-sized enterprises, government and financial institutions are valuable entities that look at their company from the outside.
For business owners who are busy with day-to-day management, the time spent talking with a third party itself becomes an opportunity to reflect on their management.
However, there are also major challenges here.
Support that only chases numbers and plans is difficult to reach the business owner's own criteria for judgment.
For example, in support situations, the following kind of conversation may occur.
The supporter says:
"According to the plan, the sales target for this term is at this level."
"So, let's strengthen new customer acquisition for that purpose."
"Let's create a monthly action plan."
This is not wrong.
Rather, it is necessary support.
However, inside the business owner, a different voice may be moving.
"I made a plan, but honestly, I am still uncertain within myself."
"I have a desire to increase sales. But I also see that my employees seem exhausted."
"New acquisition is necessary, but I am wondering if it is really okay to continue with the current way of working."
To begin with, I haven't fully grasped where my company should be heading yet.
If you proceed only with numbers and plans without addressing this uncertainty, the business owner's actions will not truly change.
There is a plan.
There are documents.
There are numerical targets.
However, there is no conviction within the business owner.
In this state, execution becomes weak.
It stops along the way.
It does not reach the front lines.
This is precisely why support from government agencies and financial institutions is difficult.
It is not easy for institutions with roles in evaluation and management to deeply empathize with a business owner's uncertainty.
Due to the system, they must confirm results.
They must look at the numbers.
They are also required to show support achievements.
However, what business owners truly need is not just the confirmation of numbers.
How to view the state of their own company.
In what order to address issues.
What not to rush, and what should be rushed.
Which decisions will have what kind of impact on employees and the organization.
It is that kind of deep dialogue.
In this regard, a framework for overseeing the entire management becomes an effective auxiliary line.
It is not about denying numbers.
It is not about making light of plans.
It is about seeing the connections of the entire management that lie behind the numbers and plans.
Sales are not growing.
Employees are not developing.
Executives are not taking action.
The front lines are not changing.
Instead of viewing these as isolated problems, view them within the relationships of the entire company.
From there, the business owner regains their own judgment.
If support from government agencies and financial institutions begins to incorporate this perspective of looking at the whole, the quality of support will change significantly.
■ The Potential for Connecting Private Support and Hands-on Support
Hands-on support is not something that can only be carried out by completely new people.
Many experts are already providing support close to business owners.
Tax accountants.
Financial institution representatives.
Small and medium enterprise management consultants.
Labor and social security attorneys.
Consultants.
Staff at chambers of commerce and industry.
Local government industrial support staff.
Supporters from business owner organizations.
These people already have contact with business owners.
Consulting on financial statements.
Consulting on cash flow management.
Listening to personnel issues.
Consulting on subsidies.
Listening to concerns about successors.
Sometimes, even listening to family issues or relationships with employees.
In short, the entry point for hands-on support already exists in the field.
What is important is not to proliferate new qualifications.
Nor is it to increase the number of titles like "hands-on supporter."
Rather, it is for those who are already involved in ways close to hands-on support to deepen their perspective and approach to that support.
To that end, there are three important perspectives.
First, having a map to view management as a whole.
In many cases, business owners speak in fragments.
"Employees aren't developing."
"We aren't making a profit."
"The executives are unreliable."
"The front lines aren't moving."
"The philosophy isn't permeating."
If you take these at face value, they appear to be individual problems.
However, if you have a map to view management as a whole, you can see where they fit within the company as a whole.
That map does not necessarily have to be a single one.
It could be management theory.
It could be a concept of organizational development.
It could be a perspective from accounting or finance.
It could be knowledge of on-site improvement.
I believe it could also be a mental map born from the experience the supporter themselves has accumulated.
What is important is not to view the business owner's concerns as isolated points, but to try to see them within the connections of the entire company.
The growth driver theory is also one such perspective.
By viewing the company from the perspectives of the president, management philosophy/vision, business model, systemization/standardization, and behavioral environment, it becomes easier to grasp the business owner's concerns not as isolated problems, but as the state of the company as a whole.
However, what is important in hands-on support is not applying a specific theory.
It is supporting the business owner so they can understand their company's state more deeply and make decisions in their own words.
Frameworks are not tools for forcing answers upon someone.
They are tools for deepening inquiry.
It does not restrict the manager's judgment.
It broadens the perspective of their judgment.
Second, it is about being conscious of the spread of influence.
In management support, there is a tendency to fall into the mindset of 'this solution for this problem'.
Recruitment is weak, so strengthen job postings.
There is high turnover, so introduce an interview system.
Meetings are not functioning, so review the meeting structure.
The philosophy is not permeating, so conduct philosophy training.
Of course, there are cases where these are effective.
However, one action will inevitably affect other areas.
Even if you strengthen recruitment, it will not lead to retention without a development system.
Even if you introduce an interview system, honest opinions will not emerge if the relationship of trust with supervisors is weak.
Even if you organize the meeting structure, it will become a mere formality if the criteria for judgment are not shared.
Even if you conduct philosophy training, it will end up as empty words if it is not linked to daily evaluations and decision-making.
In accompaniment support, we look not only at the action itself, but also at how that action affects other elements.
Third, it is the ability to choose to refrain from giving advice.
Supporters often want to give advice.
Those with more experience may see the answer.
They want to say, 'You should do this.'
However, in accompaniment support, it is important to dare not to rush into giving advice.
This is because if the manager does not think for themselves and make judgments in their own words, the company will not truly move.
The supporter provides the answer.
The manager follows it.
It might look like progress is being made temporarily.
However, that does not cultivate the manager's judgment.
It also does not lead to the company's self-propulsion.
In accompaniment support, the role of the supporter is not just to provide answers.
It is to support the manager so they can see their company as a whole and articulate their own judgments.
This change is what significantly raises the quality of private-sector support.
■ How to cultivate and support accompaniment supporters
To root accompaniment support in society, we cannot avoid the issue of how to cultivate accompaniment supporters.
Good accompaniment support cannot be sustained by the good intentions of individual supporters alone.
Also, it will not spread if it relies only on a few experienced people.
To provide support that stays close to the manager's uncertainties, sees the connections of the entire company, and improves the quality of judgment, the supporters themselves also need learning and growth.
However, what is important here is not simply that one should take a training course once.
The development of accompaniment supporters is not completed by temporary courses or obtaining certifications alone.
This is because accompaniment support is not a job that can be done just by memorizing knowledge.
A perspective on management.
The ability to grasp the whole.
The ability to formulate questions.
The ability to accept the unspoken hesitation of a business owner.
The ability to restrain oneself from wanting to give advice.
The ability to wait for the business owner's own thinking without rushing to judgment.
These are things that grow little by little through practice.
Therefore, to cultivate accompaniment supporters, at least three mechanisms are necessary.
First is a place to learn a common language.
If accompaniment supporters provide support based only on their own experience and intuition, the quality of support will inevitably be subject to individual differences.
Of course, experience and intuition are important.
However, with that alone, it becomes difficult to share, reflect on, and improve the content of the support.
That is why a common language for viewing management as a whole becomes necessary.
Where is the bottleneck in the company?
How does that bottleneck relate to the president's judgment, philosophy, the way the business is conducted, the systems in place, or the environment where employees can demonstrate their abilities?
How does one action affect other elements?
Is the business owner's hesitation merely psychological, or does it stem from the connections of the company as a whole?
To discuss these things, a language that supporters can share with one another is required.
That common language is not limited to just one.
However, to grasp a business owner's worries not just as parts but as a whole, some kind of map is necessary.
By having a map to view management as a whole, dialogue between supporters deepens, and it becomes easier to reflect on the quality of support.
Second is a place to reflect on practice.
Accompaniment supporters are in a position to support business owners.
However, the supporters themselves also experience hesitation.
How far should I step in?
Where should I wait?
Should I give advice, or should I stick to asking questions?
How should I accept the business owner's words?
Am I imposing my own values?
Am I rushing for results?
Accompaniment supporters are also constantly forced to make judgments.
That is precisely why accompaniment supporters need a place to reflect on their practice.
Bring in support cases.
Share what you were observing in which situations.
Reflect on which questions were effective.
Conversely, examine which interactions narrowed the business owner's thinking.
Put into words the supporter's own impatience and anxiety as well.
Without such a place, accompaniment supporters will become isolated.
Isolated supporters will gradually close themselves off into their own ways of doing things.
Or, under the pressure of being required to produce results, they will revert to advisory, managerial, or directive types of support.
To nurture accompaniment supporters, the supporters themselves need a space where they are accompanied.
Third is the institutional foundation to support the supporters.
Accompaniment support is a type of support where short-term results are difficult to see.
Therefore, if the institutional design is flawed, supporters will be driven to demonstrate short-term results.
How many companies were supported?
How many meetings were held?
How many plans were created?
How many subsidies were approved?
Did sales increase immediately?
If evaluated only by these indicators, accompaniment support drifts away from its true purpose.
How has the quality of the manager's decision-making changed?
How has their perspective on the company deepened?
Have they become able to perceive their uncertainties as connections across the entire company?
Has the dialogue with executives and employees changed?
Have movements to review systems and behavioral environments emerged?
These changes must also be included as subjects of evaluation.
To achieve this, it is necessary for government, financial institutions, professional organizations, educational institutions, and local support agencies to collaborate and create a system that supports accompaniment support.
For example, the following mechanisms can be considered.
Basic training for accompaniment supporters.
Practical case study sharing sessions.
Supervision among supporters.
Pair support between inexperienced and experienced supporters.
Evaluation sheets to reflect on the quality of support.
Mechanisms to record changes in managers.
Regional networks of accompaniment supporters.
Spaces for government, financial, and private supporters to learn together.
Case studies by universities and research institutions.
Spaces to confirm the ethics and stance of the supporters themselves.
Only when such mechanisms are in place will accompaniment support transcend individual capabilities and become a social system.
Nurturing accompaniment supporters is not just about teaching knowledge.
It is about creating an environment where supporters can reflect on their own involvement, continue to learn, and grow while supporting each other.
And supporting accompaniment supporters is not just about evaluating and managing them.
It is about ensuring that supporters do not become isolated, are not overly chased by short-term results, and can continue to face the deep changes of managers.
Those who accompany managers also need accompaniment.
Without this perspective, accompaniment support will not spread.
Even if it remains as the practice of a few excellent supporters, it will not become a social system.
What is needed from now on is a system to nurture, support, and connect accompaniment supporters.
This is not merely human resource development.
It is about cultivating a social foundation that supports the building of good companies.
■ Perspectives on establishing accompaniment support as a 'profession'
In order to root accompaniment support in society, its establishment as a profession cannot be avoided.
No matter how important the support is, it cannot continue if it relies solely on good intentions.
A system is needed where supporters can continue to learn, accumulate experience, and receive appropriate compensation while being involved in the long term.
However, there is a difficult problem here.
The value of accompaniment support is difficult to measure through short-term results.
Did sales increase?
Did profits grow?
Was the subsidy application accepted?
How many systems were introduced?
How many plans were created?
These are easy-to-understand indicators.
However, they are insufficient for measuring the essence of accompaniment support.
Of course, sales and profits are important.
For a company to survive, results are necessary.
Economic results cannot be ignored.
However, the value directly created by accompaniment support often appears in the stages preceding those results.
For example, changes such as the following:
The business owner has become able to view the state of their company more three-dimensionally than before.
They have become able to perceive problems not as individual employee issues, but within the overall context of management.
They have started to think about how their own decisions impact different parts of the company.
They have started to think about connecting the company's philosophy, business, systems, and the environment for employee behavior.
They have started to explain their intentions to executives and employees more carefully than before.
They have made more decisions that prepare the foundation of the company rather than relying on short-term symptomatic treatments.
These do not immediately appear in the numbers.
However, they are extremely significant changes for the company.
If the quality of a business owner's judgment changes, the way the company operates changes.
If the way the company operates changes, the way employees perceive things changes.
If the way employees perceive things changes, their behavior changes.
If behavior changes, the value provided to customers changes.
The accumulation of these changes eventually leads to results.
To establish accompaniment support as a profession, it is important to determine how to verbalize and evaluate this less visible value.
Here, too, the perspective of overseeing the entire management process serves as a clue.
Where did change occur?
Which relationships between elements have begun to align?
Where were the bottlenecks, and where has there been slight movement?
How has the business owner's judgment expanded and deepened?
What kind of actions and systems have begun to reflect management that values employees?
By viewing it in this way, the value of accompaniment support becomes something explainable rather than just a feeling.
Accompaniment support as a profession requires expertise.
However, that expertise is not just about possessing a lot of knowledge.
The ability to see management.
The ability to grasp the whole picture.
The ability to formulate questions.
The ability to wait.
The ability to refrain from giving advice.
The ability to patiently accept the unspoken hesitations of a business owner.
These are the professional competencies of accompaniment support.
However, there is something we must be careful about here.
Establishing accompaniment support as a profession does not mean merely formalizing, commercializing, and proceduralizing it.
Of course, a certain structure is necessary.
A support process is also necessary.
Evaluation perspectives are also necessary.
However, if the structure takes precedence, accompaniment support will become hollow.
Completing a number of meetings.
Filling out check sheets.
Creating plans.
Submitting reports.
That alone does not constitute accompaniment support.
Establishing accompaniment support as a profession means creating a state where supporters possess expertise and ethics, and can continue to face the deep changes of business owners.
To achieve this, it is necessary to integrate not only compensation mechanisms but also training, reflection, mutual learning among supporters, and institutional evaluation.
■ The Common Goal of "Building a Better Company"
Here, there is something I would like to confirm once again.
That is, what is the goal of accompaniment support?
What this paper aims for is not merely performance improvement.
Of course, performance is important.
Profit is also necessary.
For a company to continue, economic results cannot be taken lightly.
However, that is not all.
What this paper values is "building a better company."
A good company is one that values its employees and where both the employees and the company grow together.
This definition is not just empty rhetoric.
Rather, it is a very realistic approach to management.
A company that does not value its employees will become weak in the long term.
A company where employees do not grow cannot adapt to change.
A company where employees cannot trust each other will not produce wisdom from the front lines.
A company where employees cannot believe in the company's direction will not generate proactive actions.
On the other hand, a company that values its employees draws out their potential.
A company where employees grow improves the quality of its work.
A company where employees and the company grow together evolves the value it provides to customers.
As a result, the company gains the strength to last for a long time.
The Growth Driver Theory is a theory that attempts to grasp this kind of good company building not as a matter of spirit, but as a structure of management.
The way of being of the president.
The function of management philosophy and vision.
The validity of the business model.
The development of systemization and standardization.
The quality of the behavioral environment.
And, stretch, support, autonomy, discipline, and trust.
When these are in place and influence each other, the company begins to move little by little in a good direction.
However, what is important here as well is not to impose the theory.
In building a good company, there is the history of each company.
There are the wishes of each manager.
There is the relationship with employees.
There is the connection with the community.
There are the circumstances of the business.
Accompaniment support does not ignore these and impose an ideal image from the outside.
It is something that supports the process where the manager thinks about building a good company for their own firm and finds a direction where both the employees and the company can grow together.
The Growth Driver Theory is not a theory that commands, 'Become this kind of company.'
Nor is it a theory that imposes ideals on managers.
Instead, it is a support for managers who wish to create a company that values its employees and where both the employees and the company can grow together, in order to realize that desire.
I want to make it a good company.
However, I don't know where to start.
I want to value my employees.
However, I don't know the balance between leniency and strictness.
I want to delegate.
However, I don't know how to delegate.
I want to value my philosophy.
However, I don't know how to connect it to daily management.
It is a theory for such managers to continue thinking even while they are lost.
And, accompaniment support is a way of engaging to bring that theory to life in the field.
■ This note is also a small mechanism to support accompaniment supporters
Disseminating articles like this also has the meaning of supporting accompaniment supporters.
Accompaniment supporters are in a position to support managers.
However, the supporters themselves are also lost, worried, and struggling in the daily field.
How far should I step in?
Where should I wait?
Should I give advice, or should I stop at asking questions?
How should I accept the manager's confusion?
Is my involvement truly for the sake of the manager?
For supporters who harbor such confusion, theories and words become a form of support.
The difficulties you feel have meaning.
Even if results are not immediately visible, you are supporting the quality of the business owner's decision-making.
Accompaniment support is not a lonely individual skill, but an endeavor that should be nurtured by society.
Just by accepting this, supporters can feel a little more at ease.
And they can reflect on their own practice and regain the strength to head back into the field.
Systems and training are not the only things that support those who provide support.
Writing that shares a way of thinking.
A place to put hesitation into words.
Messages that confirm the meaning of support.
A common language that allows supporters to feel they are not alone.
These, too, are important supports for ensuring that accompaniment supporters do not become isolated.
There is another message in this note.
It is that I would like those involved in accompaniment support to view business owners' consultations not just as individual problems, but within the connections of the entire management.
Business owners' consultations are often spoken of as individual problems.
Sales are not growing.
Employees are not developing.
Executives are not taking action.
The philosophy is not permeating.
Meetings are not functioning.
Systems are not taking root.
However, are these truly individual problems?
Behind each and every problem lies the connection of the entire management.
The president's judgment.
The company's philosophy and direction.
The nature of the business.
How work is carried out.
The environment in which employees can demonstrate their abilities.
How do these relate, where are the bottlenecks, and how do they influence each other?
If you propose individual measures without looking at that, support inevitably tends to become symptomatic treatment.
Of course, concrete advice is also necessary in the field.
System building, cash flow, recruitment, and sales improvement are also important.
However, where do those concrete measures take effect within the company as a whole?
What kind of influence do they have on other elements?
How do they connect with the business owner's judgment and the employees' actions?
By engaging while looking at that overall picture, the quality of accompaniment support changes significantly.
Frameworks are not tools for forcing answers.
They are tools for deepening inquiry.
They do not restrict the business owner's judgment.
They broaden the perspective of that judgment.
As accompaniment support providers, there are things you can see precisely because you are close to the business owners.
Hesitations that cannot be seen through numbers alone.
Conflicts that cannot be seen through plans alone.
The connections of the entire company that lie beneath superficial problems.
I would like you to use your perspective that overlooks the entire management to carefully organize what you see, and support business owners so they can understand their own companies more deeply.
I believe that is the important role of accompaniment support in building better companies.
■ The future of accompaniment support will spread quietly
Accompaniment support is not a form of support that produces flashy results.
It does not promise easy-to-understand results such as:
drastically increasing sales in a short period,
changing the organization all at once,
or having employees change immediately.
Rather, the results of accompaniment support appear quietly.
The business owner's words change slightly.
They begin to consider the impact on employees before making decisions.
Dialogue with executives increases.
They rethink the meaning of meetings.
They stop leaving development solely to individuals.
They begin to treat their philosophy as a standard for judgment rather than just words on a wall.
They begin to review systems and behavioral environments before blaming employees.
These may seem like small changes.
However, it is these small changes that will transform the company.
A company does not change through a single policy.
It does not change through one excellent employee alone.
It does not change through a single decision by the business owner alone.
A company changes through the accumulation of daily judgments, relationships, systems, and actions.
Accompaniment support is support that sustains that accumulation.
The business owner observes the state of their company.
They put their hesitations into words.
They think about the meaning of their judgments.
They review their relationships with employees.
They refine their systems.
They cultivate an environment for action.
And, little by little, they change the way the company is.
That change eventually alters the relationships within the organization.
It encourages employee growth.
It enhances the value provided to customers.
It strengthens the sustainability of the company.
It also becomes a foundation that supports the local economy.
Small and medium-sized enterprises are important pillars of local communities.
They support the lives of the employees who work there, support the lives of customers, and support local employment.
The fact that these small and medium-sized enterprises are growing into better companies is not just about improving the management of a single firm.
It is also about supporting the future of the region.
That is why accompaniment support will become important for society in the future.
We need a system where we can learn from each other, grow together, and improve the quality of support, rather than relying solely on the good intentions and capabilities of individual supporters.
Government, financial institutions, experts, educational institutions, and local supporters must all support the creation of good companies from their respective positions.
In this context, Growth Driver Theory can serve as a common language for thinking about building good companies in a structural way.
However, it is not the only map.
What is important is that business owners and supporters can engage in dialogue while looking at the connections within the company as a whole. It is about trying to look together not just at the immediate problem, but at the background that is creating that problem.
Do not treat a business owner's hesitation as a personal weakness. Do not attribute employee problems solely to the individual employee's responsibility. Do not dismiss company stagnation as mere lack of effort. View management within the context of overall connections, relationships, and time horizons.
If this perspective spreads, the nature of support will change.
And there is one more important thing.
The future of accompaniment support cannot be opened by the efforts of individual supporters alone.
A place where supporters continue to learn. A place to reflect on practice. A place where supporters can support each other. A place where government, financial institutions, and experts collaborate toward a common goal. An evaluation mechanism that captures the value of support not just as short-term results, but as changes in the business owner and the company. A place where supporters can put their own hesitations and conflicts into words.
Only when these things are in place will accompaniment support become a social mechanism.
The future of accompaniment support should spread quietly.
Rather than loudly boasting about results, it changes the quality of a business owner's judgment. It prepares the foundation of the company. It supports the potential for employees and the company to grow together. And it increases the number of good companies in the region.
That is the form of accompaniment support required in the coming era.
Accompaniment support based on Growth Driver Theory will become an important social infrastructure that supports the building of good companies.
And through writings like this, accompaniment supporters themselves will also be supported, learn from each other, and connect.
That is what I believe.
■ References
Argyris, C., & Schön, D. A. (1996). Organizational learning II: Theory, method, and practice. Addison-Wesley.
March, J. G. (1994). A primer on decision making: How decisions happen. Free Press.
Higashibuchi, Noriyuki (2017). "An Approach to Building Good Companies Using Growth Driver Theory." Matsuyama University Review, Vol. 29, No. 3, 55–100.
Noriyuki Higashibuchi (2020), "New Horizons in Comprehensive Management Diagnosis Opened by Growth Driver Theory: Its Theory and Practical Report," Journal of the Japan Association for Management Systems, 19, 50–56.