PROFESSIONALS

All members share the same code of values,
with each doing their utmost on every project.

Minato Management was a business partner of the company I worked for before joining it. When I was thinking of changing jobs, CEO Kuramoto invited me to join his company, which is how I came to be here. Taking advantage of the experience gained during my previous job, I am mainly in charge of real estate-related work. However, I hardly ever do projects alone, as Minato Management’s style involves all members in every project in some way or other.

I joined the company several months before Mr. Kato. When I received the job interview through a recruitment agency, I had no specialist knowledge in finance or accounting. As I only done sales-related clerical work in my previous job, I wanted to work in a family-like company atmosphere in my next one. The interview, in which I spoke to Mr. Kuramoto, Ms. Tsuda, and Ms. Sugie, gave me the impression that my wish would come true at this company. Right now I am mainly working on solar power generation projects as a member of Ms. Tsuda’s team.

I was invited to join this company in 2013, after returning from studies in the US, by Mr. Kuramoto and Ms. Sugie, who used to be my colleagues at Ernst & Young. Currently my main role is to represent the company when starting projects and in other irregular situations, while monitoring the progress of all projects. Another important role is to negotiate financial arrangements with financial institutions. I had to spend the first few years following Mr. Kuramoto to learn the necessary expertise from him, as you cannot speak to specialists from the same perspectives unless you have some specialist knowledge.

I built up more than ten years of experience in accounting auditing and IPO support operations at the predecessor company to Ernst & Young ShinNihon LLC as a certified public accountant. I developed experience also at Ernst & Young and a consulting company associated with enterprise turnaround after acting as chief examiner at a major manufacturer and in the steel industry. After that, I was invited by Mr. Kuramoto, my former colleague, to join his company and decided to work with him. At present, I am responsible for internal audits. As we are expected to work in compliance with the Financial Instruments and Exchange Act, my role is to strictly check whether everyone at the company observes all the relevant rules. Besides these roles, my responsibilities include dealing with audits of applications for new business licenses and making initial-stage judgements for new projects. When we are starting a new project, I predict risk and express my opinion. The other members are ready to listen to me, despite the fact that I am not a frontline worker, which I think is one of the strengths of our company.

An all-out focus on the good of
clients through tailored product design.

Because we are not a large company, our operations might not be as dynamic as them. But the other side of the coin is that we excel at small, detailed projects. Generally speaking, larger companies tend to create packaged products and market them on a mass scale. By contrast, one characteristic that differentiates Minato Management from other companies is that we design products that are tailored to the needs of individual clients. This can be compared to custom-made suits that are tailored one by one, as opposed to mass-produced ready-made clothing.

Each member has an extremely high sense of professionalism. Everyone carries out what they are supposed to do as professionals in their own respective domains based on a good understanding of their own roles, and what they should do, while helping and complementing each other when the need arises. This is the kind of attitude shared by everyone here at the company. At the very root of the attitude lies the values that we all have in common, such as, “provide the best services to clients” and “extract essential value,” as Mr. Kuramoto says. Besides this professionalism, our relationship, which keeps all members in the picture and enables us to complement each other, also creates a positive impact not only within the company but outside it as well. As such, I believe we can offer advantages that genuinely meet clients’ needs.
Furthermore, we focus on fulfilling our responsibilities, rather than profit, even if that involvesgoing beyond the scope of the contract. As long as there are good prospects for improvement and there is still room for us to do something about the situation, we will not hesitate to do so. This also leads to us setting no limits to our abilities, which, I believe, makes us a company where members help each other to strengthen and expand their possibilities for growth as part of society. There are times when we are loaded down with work, and that is when peer support is most helpful. I can keep up the hard work because I love this company and I am sure my colleagues will always be there to help when I’m in a predicament.

This may be something to do with what Ms. Tsuda just said, but a characteristic of Minato Management is that it is “a family-like company,” in my opinion. In my previous job, it was unclear who I was working for. Now, by contrast, I am aware that I am working for this company—in other words, for all my fellow members. Perhaps this is a feeling that every member of the company shares. I find it amazing that we all share this awareness as our common ground. This prevents any of us from working halfheartedly and allows everyone to demonstrate their full potential to maximize our performance. We are in a genuine relationship of trust with each other, which makes me feel grateful for being able to work for this company. This may be a digression, but becoming tired from laughing a lot, just like a student, is just another day at the office for us at this company. I really enjoy working here.

I always tell interviewees in job interviews that the important thing is to respect each other. Everyone gives each other some space and there is no noise to distract us, which means there is not need to spend unnecessary energy. This enables you to focus all your energy for the good of clients.

Precisely assess the true value
of projects and find optimal solutions
by reflecting many different standpoints.

Investment projects naturally involve the many different standpoints of financial institutions and investors. In my opinion, the most important value we can provide lies in our ability to find optimal solutions that maximize the true value of each asset and result in the best performance for all recipients of returns. It is our role, as a management business, to accurately assess the true value of each project and plan a path leading to it. At the same time, we do not impose our views on others, of course, and constantly search for solutions that are optimal for everyone involved in each project.

Let me speak about my area of responsibility. Believing that finance and real estate are two sides of the same coin, I work to create new real estate investment projects based on the principle that they provide value. Although real estate investment products are often seen as nothing more than the pursuit of returns, they have the potential to allow you to create innovative investment projects from different perspectives, such as by taking advantage of the depreciation or tax system. What is more, they can produce extra value beyond just the properties themselves, like when they help to build a town or culture. Such products can be offered only when society needs them. I believe Minato Management should always be a company that meets social needs. As far as my own area of responsibility is concerned, our value is that we can provide “product designs that maximize client performance.”

We are a small and relatively agile business. I think our strength lies in the ability to customize our services to meet the varying needs of individual clients. Our relationships of trust with clients, which result from such responsiveness, leads, in turn, to repeat business from existing clients, who often introduce new customers to us.

As I had no specialist knowledge about finance or accounting, I have learned all the things we should know in this industry right here at Minato Management. Recently, there was a time when I was working with another company, and someone from the company was surprised to see me do something I thought of as just normal, saying “Did you go as far as that?” When I joined this company, Mr. Kuramoto gave me detailed instructions even on the smallest things, such as document fonts. This experience has made all those small things I learned feel “just normal” to me. I believe our company can provide value by offering such diligence, which feels “just normal” to us, to other companies. We maintain high standards as a normal part of doing business, putting ourselves in the clients’ shoes and respond carefully to their needs even if that involves going beyond the scope of the contract. I think the relationships of trust with clients that we enjoy now are the fruit of these efforts.

Being a global company that helps boost
the value of Japan through socially
relevant investments.

The financial and real estate industries are where many different values intersect. In such circumstances, we want to be there for people, so that they can rely on us, saying, “We have Minato Management to turn to for help.” Furthermore, market-wise, we want to discover value where no one else sees it, and explore what assets are really worth. I believe this will result in us helping to boost Japan’s value to the world and fulfilling our responsibilities in an increasingly globalized society. When I was living in Indonesia and the US, I learned, through speaking to people from other countries, that they had strong pride in their own nations. I felt diversity firsthand and gradually came to think about what more I should and could do as a Japanese person. After returning to Japan, I met Mr. Kuramoto again, and he helped summarize my thoughts, which would later be incorporated into the current values of Minato Management.

I am working in the industry of income property, where you are doomed to lose as long as your products are nothing special. I want to increase the market value of our products by spicing them up in Minato Management’s unique way and making them one of a kind.

Meeting the needs of clients is, of course, important, but I think we need to do more than that. We should provide socially relevant investments that go beyond profitability, so that people will recognize Minato Management as a company that supports social causes. This inevitably requires trust from clients, which we have to keep building. However, I think this is the company’s ultimate purpose. I want us to be a company that can return some extra happiness to the client when commissioned by them.

The disposal that Ms. Imamura completed up to the exit the other day is a good example of how much she can do, as she did an excellent job identifying and solving problems one by one. I know this may sound like self-praise, but I am sure the client is feeling that it would not have been possible without Minato.

It is difficult to be sure of yourself, but hearing you say so fills me with plenty of confidence!

Nothing is better than when clients are glad to have asked Minato Management for help. We are planning to increase the number of projects related to community revitalization, called “local production for local consumption funds,” in the future, which will enhance the unique value Minato Management offers.