đŸȘŽ Quartz 4.0

Opportunities for decision-making are a dime a dozen.

Feb 11, 20249 min read

  • Essay written in response to a request to write about [decision Written in December 2017, published the following year.

Web+DB Press Vol. 102 Commemorative Essay “Decisions made at that time”

Profile

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Cybozu Labs since 2007; published “The Technology Behind Coding” (Gijutsu Hyoron Co., Ltd.) in 2013; entered Tokyo Institute of Technology as a working graduate student in 2011; obtained Master of Technology Management in 2014; board member of Mito, a general incorporated association, since 2015; technical advisor of B-Ploud in 2017.

Opportunities for good decisions are not known in advance.

  • The extent to which a decision will affect one’s future is not known at the time of the decision. The idea that “the Opportunity to make a decision that will have a great impact on my life will come in a way that is easy to understand” is as dubious as “Someday my prince who will make me happy will come riding in on a white horse.”

Snowball of Influence

  • Each small decision brings an opportunity for another decision. By repeating a string of decisions, the influence of a decision gradually grows.

  • When I was 21 years old, I applied for the “Unexplored Youth” program, a talent search project sponsored by the Information-technology Promotion Agency, Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry (METI), which had a major impact on my life. To other people, it may seem that I suddenly had an opportunity to make a big decision and I did. In fact, however, there was a smaller decision that came before that.

  • That is, when I was 19 years old, I attended a study group that was held in my hometown. I happened to see it on the Web and attended it because the venue was local. At the reception, I sat next to a famous teacher whom I did not know at the time. He invited me to attend the national conference of the Japanese Society for Artificial Intelligence, and I did. I didn’t know it at the time, but it is rare for a minor to attend a conference on his own. My name became known there, and after various chains of events, I started working part-time at a venture in Kansai Science City (nicknamed Keihanna Science City). It was there that I learned about Python and was told that the application process for the Unexplored Youth Program had begun. I applied and was accepted. Later, when I was 23 years old, I learned about Cybozu Labs, which had just been established at that time, at a drinking party where MYPTOM graduates gathered, and I joined the company.

  • In other words, if I had not made the decision to join the first study group, I would not be using Python, would not have joined Cybozu Labs, and would not have become a board member of the Unexplored Foundation.

Goes to Tokyo Institute of Technology to study Management of Technology

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  • Up to this point, my story has been driven by the circumstances around me. From here, as an example of resisting headwinds, I will talk about re-entering graduate school while still a working adult.

  • At the time, I did not feel that I was contributing much to the company and was mentally weak. At the time, a novel based on Drucker’s book was popular, and I tried reading it, but I found Drucker’s book more interesting than the novel version. The most popular book was “Management Essential Edition,” but as an engineer, I found “The Condition of Professionals,” “The Condition of Technologists,” and “Post-Capitalist Society” (see note) more interesting.

    • Note: All four books are written by Peter Ferdinand Drucker and edited and translated by Atsuo Ueda (only “Post Capitalist Society” is translated), Diamond Inc. The years of publication are 2001, 2000, 2005, and 2007.

  • As I read through the book, I noticed a “blind spot”. I realized that there were many concepts in the area of business administration that I had not been aware of in my life and that were worth learning. So I decided to re-enter graduate school to learn more.

  • When I discussed this with my boss at the time, he was opposed. Looking back, it would be natural to stop an employee who is mentally weak from doing graduate school while also being a member of society, worrying that the increased workload would crush him.

should make a decision now, make a decision

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  • For example, when you are faced with a decision at work, the decision itself may be difficult, but finding the “opportunity to make a decision” is easy. On the other hand, when you have to make a decision to do something that no one tells you to do or that your boss tells you not to do, there is no certainty that it is really a “decision opportunity. Should we really do it now? Couldn’t it be done in a few years? What about the risk of displeasing my boss? Considering these things, it is overwhelmingly easier to choose “not to do it. In the face of these headwinds, I decided that “now is the right time to make a decision,” instead of postponing the decision.

Impact of the decision

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  • When I told my boss that I had reconsidered, but was still going to do it, he gave me the OK surprisingly easily, which was a bit of a letdown. Perhaps it was the determination in my face that I was still going to do it, even if he opposed it.

  • The way I worked at the company also changed. Before that, I often worked late into the night, but I had to cut out quickly in order to attend classes in the evening. After I was in that situation, I looked around me and found that there were other people who were finishing their work at a certain time and using it for personal investment. I just didn’t realize it at the time. In the past, I had unknowingly given up opportunities for self-investment.

Now that I look back and think about it

  • Although I spend less time at the office, I don’t want people to think that I don’t work because I go to college. So instead of getting paid for my time, I began to proactively define what my contribution is and try to create it in the limited time I have.

  • Some people may think this is “a natural thing for a member of society. However, in retrospect, before I studied business administration, I was a person who did not understand the obvious. At the time, I was making presentations that used Python syntax in tricky ways to get laughs, and I was using my ability to grasp a complex system like Python syntax, to come up with tricky ways to string elements together, and to bring them to fruition as a one-shot performance. I wasn’t able to understand my strengths and use them to create a contribution to society, which is the obvious thing to do.

  • I am often asked, “What did you learn in college and how did it help you?” I am often asked, “What did you learn in college and how did it help you? To name one obvious one, “The Art of Supporting Coding,” which I wrote while still in college, became an Amazon bestseller and continues to sell well. It is not about writing what you want to write, nor what you can write, but what is needed based on an assessment of the needs of society. This is the basis of product development.

  • In an early draft of the book, he wrote, “The purpose of this book is to solve the mumbo-jumbo about programming. For example, there is a need in society to understand “object orientation” and to have a book that clearly explains it. Filling that need is our contribution to society.

Summary

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  • The closer we get to the present, the more we cannot talk about. The closer we get to the present, the more we can’t talk about, because there are things we are not allowed to disclose yet. You will be able to observe them eventually, and when you reread this article in a few years, you may think, “Well, that makes sense. These large observable events may look like individual events to you, but subjectively, they are a string of beads. It is not the individual beads, but the bead as a whole that is important.

  • Opportunities for decisions are connected like beads, rather than one big opportunity at a time. Then, by making decisions on small opportunities, larger opportunities gradually come along, and the impact of the decision grows. Only those with a large impact can be observed by a third party.

  • Business Administration is for everyone except those who are “just doing the job they are told to do.” The “Let’s Change Perspectives” (see note), which we previously serialized in this magazine, was an ambitious experiment in talking about topics in business administration in a technical magazine. We struggled to keep it to two pages each time, but I think we were able to provide a fairly dense explanation in a small number of pages.

  • In a project like this essay, there is a bias that what is easy to write about gets written about. In terms of contribution to my life, the decision to “marry this person” is the biggest one, but I don’t think I can write here about the process leading up to the decision. I will put down my pen while thanking my wife.

relevance

  • [/wakate2021/Invited Lecture “Designing ways of learning - More options for problem solving”](https://scrapbox.io/wakate2021/Invited Lecture “Designing ways of learning - More options for problem solving”)

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