When Bold Strategy Becomes a Bet You Can’t Afford to Lose

Honda just announced its first net loss since listing on the Tokyo Stock Exchange in 1957. The company cancelled three EV models it had been engineering for years — the Honda 0 SUV, the Honda 0 Saloon, and the Acura RSX — writing off up to ¥2.5 trillion in assets and supplier commitments in a single fiscal year.

That fact alone is worth sitting with. This is not a story about a company that failed to try.

It is a story about the difference between boldness and prudence — and what happens when a business has the first without the second.

説得力のある戦略とは

トップレベルの役員やマネージャーであれば、戦略を立ててそれをプレゼンする機会を与えられることがある筈です。彼らの多くは、自分の作った戦略が正しいことを証明するための長いプレゼンテーションを用意します。しかし、真に説得力のあるマネージャーであれば、逆に何故自分の戦略が間違っている可能性があるか、という理由を並べる筈です。

CSRは贖宥状とはならない

ビジネスリーダー達が、企業の社会的責任を果たすことで、倫理的に問題があるのではないかと考えられるようなビジネスの埋め合わせをしようとするのを目にすると、不安にさせられます。

[:en]Old Strategy[:]

[:en]Steven shares three reasons why companies are reluctant to change old strategy and offers three techniques to overcome this problem.[:]

[:en]Worldview[:ja]世界観[:]

[:en]Last week while in New York, I learned of a stabbing of an 18-year-old Japanese woman in a neighborhood close to where I live in Tsukuba. The news came via an email from Tsukuba International School, where my son attends, warning caution. Violent crime in Japan is far rarer than in the United States, and almost unheard of in Tsukuba, so this incident was jarring for many people. Having left my wife and son in Japan, I felt uneasy with the notion that there was some violent criminal at large in our peaceful neighborhood. The victim described the attacker to police as a man wearing a mask and speaking “broken Japanese,” […]

jaJapanese