Fujiko Suda: Worklife

Your obser­va­tions are inter­est­ing, but I think we should be care­ful when mak­ing absolute pro­nounce­ments about human activ­i­ties. We in indus­tri­al­ized rich coun­tries like to say that the world is in an age of unprece­dented inno­va­tions. Is this true? I won­der. We know more about outer space than we do about the inside of the human body. Does age really mat­ter when it comes to inno­va­tion? Is it not the social con­di­tions and beliefs that lead us to think so? Older peo­ple can­not think as actively as young peo­ple. That is what we are told by the media, by soci­ety. In the so-called “prim­i­tive” soci­eties inno­va­tion never stops because con­di­tions demand it from everyone.

After I retired at 61, I was asked to teach uni­ver­sity courses at a Japan­ese uni­ver­sity in Japan­ese. I began reluc­tantly because it meant strug­gling to improve my Japan­ese at my age, but now enjoy it because I can meet and help to nuture young minds; not only the stu­dents, but young edu­ca­tors as well. More recently, I was asked to replace the younger head of my depart­ment as head because I am bet­ter adpated to receiv­ing and using new ideas.

Does age really mat­ter in inno­va­tion? What Japan needs is fresh ways of look­ing at all prob­lems. Life is com­plex. Soci­ety is com­plex. Why make it even more com­plex with estab­lished misconceptions.

Many thanks for your com­ment, ????????????-san! I re-read my entry, and found that it does indeed sound really strong, and I see it can eas­ily lead to mis­con­cep­tions. I appre­ci­ate com­ments like yours, since it makes me more aware of the fact that what I say on the blog some­time is misleading.

As I quote S. Chadrasekhar, he also says in Truth and Beauty that there are excep­tions to such gen­er­al­iza­tion too. Kono­suke Mat­sushita was known for inno­v­a­tive ideas as he grew older. Peter Drucker keeps on going with his inno­v­a­tive ideas. The point I wanted to make is not that older peo­ple can­not think actively. Per­haps you might have worked with major Japan­ese com­pa­nies in Japan who had young depart­ment man­agers, but in the few com­pa­nies I worked with, it is such rar­ity that a depart­ment man­ager is younger than 40.

In gen­eral, younger peo­ple do rash things. They are not often not afraid of doing these kind of things. Break­through inno­va­tion often comes from not avoid­ing fail­ures. I am mak­ing a gen­er­al­iza­tion that older peo­ple in Japan who are in depart­ment manager’s posi­tion at major com­pa­nies are good at avoid­ing fail­ures. Thus, avoid­ing fail­ures often mean putting a lid on wild ideas, pos­si­ble seed for inno­va­tion, by people.