On August 1, I went to Fukuoka to do a session for the Japan Future Leaders School. This is 2-week school for the highschool students throughout the country. This year marks the seventh of the school and they had 180 high school students.
This is the first time I was invited to do a session. The speakers are like “Who’s Who” in politics, art, science, business etc. etc. I felt honored to be invited among such a distinguished group of people.
The title of my session was “New era of the 21st century, new business and new career.” I did one-hour interactive session, starting with”what was your dream when you were a kid?” and asking various questions such as ”what did you buy recently?” Students were quite active in responding and I had a lot of fun moderating the session. At the end, we had 30 minute Q & A session.
My session was followed by the discussion by students in 8 groups, some of which I visited. They were debating “Do we need degrees from good schools?” ”How do we let the world know of the beauty of Japan?” etc.
I wish I could have visited all of the groups, but time did not allow me to do so.
I had an opportunity to attend the session by Mr. Toshiro Nakamura,founder of Nakamura Brace. I had wanted to meet with him as I had heard so much about the company, and it was such an honor.
I love interacting with high school students, as they are the future. Though it was a bit hectic as we tried to squeeze many things and I had to rush back to Tokyo for another meeting, it was very inspiring and exciting day and a half.
Yoko Ishikura is a Professor at Hitotsubashi University ICS in the Graduate School of International Corporate Strategy in Japan. She has held positions as a professor at the School of International Politics, Economics and Business of Aoyama Gakuin University in Tokyo, as a consultant at McKinsey and Company Inc. Japan and a visiting professor at Darden School.
Professor Ishikura is a consultant to a number of multinational companies and has been a frequent speaker at management conferences, seminars, and workshops throughout the world. She was a member of the Regulatory Reform Committee for the Japanese government and the International Competitiveness Commission for METI. She is currently a Forum Fellow of the World Economic Forum.
She is the author of Strategic Shift from OR choices to AND paradigm, Building Core Skills of Organization , and the co-author of the following publications: Managing Diversity in the 21st Century, Strategy for Cluster Initiatives in Japan , and Building a Career to the World Class Professionals – all in Japanese. Her books in English include: Asian Advantage, Hitotsubashi on Knowledge Management and Trust and Antitrust in Asian Business Alliances.
Professor Ishikura’s current research interests are focused on global competition, innovation, and knowledge management. She received her BA from Sophia University in Tokyo, Japan; MBA from Darden School, University of Virginia in Charlottesville, Virginia; and DBA from Harvard Business School.
