Organizational Transformation in Uncertain Period: Lessons
from “Ten cow’s figure”

Hiroshi Komiriya (J-Feel Inc)
Abstract
In this globally connected world, we currently have a numberof difficulties such as financial crisis in 2008, scandals of
mega-industries, collapse of nations, environmental problems,resource shortage, and danger of war. Despite these
difficulties, we, humans, seem to have to go through even more
uncertain period. Whereas we need to deal with the radical
changes in our life, people in companies and organizations alsoneed to change. Then, how should we change for our future? Weneed the right direction, right deepness, and right speed forchanging. To make these “right” decisions, we must to know
where we are—namely self-awareness. In Japan, there is Zen as
an excellent methodology for self-awareness. In this paper, I
focus on“ Ten cow’s figure,” a ten-frame drawings with ten
different situations representing processes to the true self.
This is a manual for practitioner of Zen austerities. It isdaunting task for a person to achieve the change of his/hernature, appearance, and mind. This study aims to utilize Ten
cow’s figure to examine essentials for the change by applying
the figure to a case of vision-sharing project in a company. The
results reveal the three critical factors: devoting oneself,
emancipating oneself from persistence, and playing.

Key Words：
changeself-awareness, devotion, emancipation, play,1． Introduction
Currently, uncertainty and unpredictability for societies seem to be
monotonically increasing under the situation with rapid development oftechnology, diversity of people’ values, unsolved problems on population,
environment destructions, conflicts among nations, and poverty.
Similarly, social and economic environments are also changing theirnature, resulting in, not surprisingly, fundamental change of businessworld and business models. Many people seem to feel that they are
actually in a major and radical transition period.
Recently, I had an opportunity to discuss on the future of car
business. A manager in a car making company said, “When we willchange our major products from the gasoline‐ powered vehicle to theelectricity-powered one in the future, we expect that new entries will
come because the electricity-powered vehicle requires much less numberof parts and its architecture is much simpler than the gasoline-powered
one. It implies that the vertical integrated model, which requires
sensitive and long-term coordination and currently only major carcompanies can implement, will be useless. We seriously concern it.”This kind of expectation on the major transition in the businessworld seems to be spread beyond car business. Under this majortransition period, many unexpected things are happening in the businessworld: strength changes into weakness, powerful company lose the power,
and unexpected competitive rivalries come out. It is often happening thatthe conventional ideas and ways turn to be useless, and useful skills turnto be out of date rapidly. To be lively individual and organization, it is
not sufficient to keep “status-quo” against these changes nor to react
super-sensitively. What, then, should we do to make better change fororganizations and working individuals there?
It is daunting task for an individual to achieve the change of his/hernature, appearance, and mind. This paper focuses on “ Ten cow’s figure,”known as a manual for changing, to explore the ques with Zen, a
traditional Japanese methodology for self-awareness.1
This paper, with a practical purpose, takes clinical approach (Schein,
1987) as its methodology since I have experienced as a businesspractitioner to help business companies for strategy building, vision
sharing, and changing organizational culture. The clinical approachrefers to a practical method to research social phenomena by actively
approaching to targets, based on the tradition since Lewin’s statement“the best way to understand a system with humans is to try to change it.”
In particular, I take a case of development of an organization for
re-creating and sharing its vision. I would like to note that I do notdeclare the specific company name for confidentiality agreement.

2． What are necessary for organizations under uncertain era?
Under a slowly-changing business environment, repeating the sameactivities could lead to greater efficiency and organization can enjoy thebenefit of “economy of experience.” However, we are under a rapidlychanging unpredictable period. What we first need to understand isrealize that conventional and traditional ways are not necessarily
efficient anymore. It is now often the case that routine work along withrules can create nothing (Ebisawa, 2012). Under such an environment, towork on the environment by independency based on what comes up in themind should be critically important. It means that the most important
core is something difficult to measure and invisible such as individual’s
thought, will, and belief.
For example, the idea of the small car, “Nano” by Tata Motors
Limited from India was created when the founder, Ratan Naval Tata,
1

Quoting Suzuki’s statement (Suzuki, 1997) “the right contribution from the Eastern tothe upcoming world culture, Ueda suggests the importance of “we are Easternized not
because we are Eastern, rather there is something Japanese has forgot as
Easterner”(Suzuki: 324). I interpret this that we should be open for the world but at thesame time we should face our origin of ourselves in this globalization era.

thought that many Indians could move without wetting if they could haveaffordable (100,000 Rupee value) car while watching a vast amount ofmotorbikes in the town of Mumbai under the heavy rain (Johnson etal. ,2008). He developed a new market with his unique observation andinspiration by observing from an ordinary and common-looking scene.
In addition, when dealing with an unexperienced phenomenon, it isoften the case that a mindset that seeks easy and rapid prescription would
cause more problems. There is no single “magic medicine” for betterchange. To explore for better future, it is not a good idea to employ
good-looking techniques and radically appealing new methods, nor tosimply add new knowledge to existing ideas and methods.
Therefore, the important thing for individuals and organizations
exist deeper inside of schema of our thinking style, our values, our
visions, and organizational cultures (Schein, 2010) under thisunpredictable period. The nature of this is to explore toward deeper andinvisible level to continue proceeding forward with holding consistency
with the most important values, on the other hand, with practicing
continuous self-denial just like as metamorphose of larvae to pupae,
pupae to butterfly. For such a practice, I argue that the most important
thing is to watch ourselves and our organizations with such a deeper
mindset, because it is essential to practice for coming to deep
understanding of “what is myself and my organization” in order todetermine “how to change myself and my organization in better
direction.”
It often happens that we rarely try to seriously face ourselvesbecause our “self” seems to be so natural and common. Revealing this,Ueda & Yanagida argue “too much self-conscious but lack ofself-awareness.” (Ueda & Yanagida, 1992:17)。 Too much self-conscious
causes a cognitive distortion that the self gets lost in self although theself is identical to the self. Applying this to business organizations, Ifind that they are forced to seek efficiency, homogenization, andstandardization under the slogan of globalization, resulting in
self-alienation or missing self.

In such a case, break-through for betterchange is possible by deeply asking what is the self to oneself2. The term“change” refers to transition into deeper level of existence, and in otherwords, awareness for the new self to step into a new dimension.
For example. Yvon Chouinard, the founder of Patagonia, Inc., awell-known outdoor goods brand with huge contribution for environment,
stated, when Patagonia had serious financial problem, “I asked myself,
why I am doing this business, How I wanted to make Patagonia,” to find a
new way of management (Chouinard, 2007:97).
Buddhism, a familiar religion for Japanese, is the ultimate
methodology for investigating self. The practice of Zen, one of the
Buddhism schools, ultimately aims “Self Realization (Koji-kyuumei: 己事 究 明 )”(Iriya, 2012:260)。 Self Realization (Koji-kyuumei) is to realize
the self as the fact that we believe that we know what the self is, but weactually do not. Nishida (2012) states, “There is the only real goodness.
It is to know realize the true self” (Nishida, 2012:221). Ten Cow’s Figure,a basic Zen text material, is showing metaphor of the process to find thetrue self with the story of a cowherd who has lost his cow. It would give
us insightful suggestions to guide for individuals and organizations toface the self and to find the way to go.
Most of the past literature in management study have emphasized
universality and rationality for seeking “the answer,” based on theobservation that business entities as static target for analysis. As seen ina well-known waka-style poem by Kamono Chomei (a Japanese author,
poet (in the waka form), and essayist in the 12st century), “The flow of
the river is ceaseless and its water is never the same”
2

Izutus claims that the most fundamental of Eastern philosophies refers to“self-exploring,” and self-exploring leads to “fundamental change of human existence”(Izutsu, 2014a:482).

(Kamono(Ichiko),1989:9), companies appearing unchanged is actually
never static, rather, keeping changing continuously. Too much emphasis
on universality fails to find the nature and fails to grasp dynamic activity
with complex causalities and contingencies. To grasp such dynamics, it
should be important to seriously look at the reality, to find the nature of
the problem. The core of the earliest Buddhism philosophy contains thefour seals of the Dharma: "Shogyo Mujo（ 諸 行 無 常 ） " (all things mustp a s s ) , “ S h o h o M u g（a 諸 法 無 我 ）” ( a l l t h i n g s i n t h e u n i v e r s e l a c k t h e i r o w nunchangeable substances), “Issai Kaiku（ 一 切 皆 苦 ） ”(all things arecauses of sufferings), and “Nehan Jakujyo（ 涅 槃 寂 静 ） ”(enlightenment
leads to serenity). Shogyo Mujo means that all the things chronicallyk e e p c h a n g i n g , n o t h i n g r e m a i n s s t a t i c a t e a c h m o m e n t ( S u e k i 、2 0 0 6 : 5 6 ) 。
In this study, I take the perspective of Zen, the ultimate form of
Buddhism philosophy’s “everything changes” to understand dynamism ofcompany’s activity in utilizing the implications from Ten Cow’s Figure,In the next part, I introduce the outline of Ten Cow’s Figure.

3． Outline of Ten Cow’s Figure.
Ten Cow’s Figure, drawn by Kakuan Zen priest, is “Originally, a basic
m a n u a l f o r Z e n t r a i n e e ” ( U e d a & Y a n a g i d a 、1 9 9 2 : 1 8 ) , a n d t h e s e q u e n c e o f
ten frames represents the process to the true self with ten different
situations. Beyond the Zen training, I believe that this figure can beapplied for deep realization of how the self exists. The cow in this figureis the metaphor of the true self, and the cowherd is the self who searching
the true self (Ueda & Yanagida,1992:31).
The first scene is “Jin-Gyu (尋 牛 ),” “find yourself losing the cow.”
Here, it shows that the most important thing is to recognize that you lostthe cow, because, in many cases, you are not aware that you had actually
lost it. Your self-conscious is always too much, but yourself-understanding already had changed to self-misunderstanding, andyour self-awareness already had lost the awareness to reach theself-unawareness (Ueda & Yanagida, 1992： 33). Thus, it is necessary to
be aware that you are unaware of the true self. You should also ask why
you need to seek “the cow= the true self.” One of the reasons seems to bebecause you need to know “what is yourself” to know how you should live.
This first drawing describes the situation where you are motivated toseek, but you never find the cow (representation of your true self) andyou do not know which way you should go, you are mentally tired as well
as physically, and you are lost.
The second drawing is called “Ken-seki (見 跡 )”, meaning “look at
the footprint of the cow.” The footprint here represents Buddha’s
teaching and Buddhism itself. This stage means that you have leaned
Buddhism and you ambiguously understand what to do. In this stage,
however, you learned only knowledge of Buddhism, not mastered it yet.
This “Ken-seki” stage shows that what you have learned exists as justyour knowledge. In Buddhism, “Nothing belongs to yourself (Nakamura,
1978:49)” is the basic rationale. This idea is also mentioned“Motsuga-Ichinyo (物 我 一 如 ) (unity of subjectivity and objectivity), andJita-Funi (自 他 不 二 ) (no boundary between self and others),” and these
are together called “Funi no Homon (不 二 の 法 門 ) (dharma-gate ofnon-duality.)” Akizuki states “” Bemusement” refers to see“two(different)” in originally “one (equal), and “enlightenment” refers
to finding in originally “one (equal)”in two(different)”.” This is thestate where no difference nor judgment exists, and everything isconnected in the deepest level.
For example, we often get angry when things are not going as
expected. There are many such cases: subordinates ddi not move alongwith your direction, sales could not achieve the goal, and yourassessment from HR division was lower than your expectation. For
another example, we react emotionally to the opposite opinion with thefeeling that people deny ourselves. These examples represent the statethat you distinguish self from others due to your selfish and constrained
thought. If you emancipate yourself and deeply understand others’
perspectives, the boundary between self and others will disappear, andyou will feel much more comfortable even though the situation remains
the same. On the other hand, it is much harder to go into this state even if
you think you understand it. This “Ken-seki” stage shows “I know but I
cannot do it.”
The third drawing is “Ken-gyu (見 牛 ), meaning “looking at the cow.”
It shows a big progress since the cowherd actually looks at the cow. He
senses the true self. What makes him to look at it is to devote himself
into “Now and Here.” This is the state that “you become the plum flower
when you draw a plum flower (Suzuki,2003:93),” described by Suzuki, a
Buddhism philosopher, and the seeable world by Zanmai (intenseconcentration achieved through meditation). This drawing also showsthat the cowherd is trying to keep his eyes on the cow and desperately
chasing the cow. There is the revealed willingness to catch it by physicalactivity. There is the statement “there are roughly two ways to learn
Buddhism: learn by the mind, and learn by the body” in “Shinjin Gakudo”
from “Shobo Genzo” (series of books for Buddhism philosophy) by Dogen(Dogen、 1990:127) and this statement suggests the importance of
embodiment. This is called “acquiring,” meaning that you never master itwith the learning from understanding until the learning from experience.
Following this drawing, the relationship between the cow and thecowherd is gradually becoming closer and developing to capturing thecow (Toku-gyu (得 牛 )), and taming the cow (Boku-gyu (牧 牛 )). The threesteps of find-capture-tame represents the steps for enlightenment in the
narrow sense.
The forth drawing is “Toku-gyu,” meaning capturing the cow. The
cowherd finally caputues the cow, but he still forcibly pulls the cow witha tight rope. Although the cowherd’ self and his true self are connectedwith the rope, there is a considerable tension and conflict between them.
The cowherd might be dragged by the cow. The raging cow represents thedifficulty and hardness to integrate both selves. Capturing the cow itself
is hard enough, but another kind of difficulty comes up after thecapturing. We can easily imagine that continuous efforts and practice arestill needed even though separation now starts to change toward
integration in this stage.
The fifth drawing is “Boku-gyu.” This is the stage of taming the cow
rather than forcing the cow. It shows the cow, used to try to run away, is
now voluntarily following the cowherd． This represents the process thatthe thing one used to simply look at becomes the thing one now starts tomaster. The loose rope symbolizes it. We can read from this that ,although the cow and the cowherd still hold duality, the duality changed
into positive and harmonious one (Ueada & Yanagida, 1992： 42). So far,I have discussed from the perspective of the cowherd who works on thecow, but I would like to note that we should pay attention to anotherpossible interpretation that the cow also works on the cowherd. That is tosay, the cow representing the true self tells him that you are lost (尋 牛 ),leaves its footprint for him (見 跡 ), partially appears（ 見 牛 ） , lets him
captures,p u l l h i m f o r c i b l y（ 得 牛 ）, a n d l e a d s h i m t o t h e r i g h t d i r e c t i o n（ 牧 牛 ） . We should keep in mind that we can see wider world byconsidering the by-directional interpretation.
The sixth one is “Kigyu-kika (騎 牛 帰 家 ),” meaning “coming home on
the cow’s back.” Blowing on a pipe, the cowherd goes back to home on
the cow’s back. Both the cow and cowherd look happy. They also appear
to unite to the sky and ground with the melody of the pipe. These
represent the sequence of conflicting between self and the true self,
integration from division, and the steps of unity. This scene showscoming back to his original home, the cowherd achieves something with

fun, without force nor convulsive efforts.
The seventh drawing is “Bogyu-zonjin（ 忘 牛 存 人 ） ,“ meaning “thecow forgotten, leaving the cowherd alone.” The cow, which he used todesperately try to find, now disappeared, and the cowherd is fall into adoze. Because the attention, captive, and persistence to the cow had gone,
duality of the cowherd and cow has been sublated, and aqualitatively-changed new self is emerging. This is the state ofintegration of self and the true self.
Having looked at from the first to the seventh drawing, it looks thatthe steps of self-realization have competed. Until this step, there has
always been a conscious purpose to reach self-realization. From here,
this purpose no longer exists. If you are desperate to achieve the goal, it
becomes persistence. This is the stage where he has emancipate such
persistence. This is the world where the true drawers never findthemselves drawing, and the true dancers never realize they are dancing.
As the statement by Akizuki, “It is not genuine if it has purpose and will”.
Thus, the eighth one goes to the next stage of post- purposive.
The eighth drawing is “Ningyu-gubo (人 牛 倶 忘 ),” meaning “the cow
and the cowherd both gone out of sight.” The cow had gone in the seventh,
the cowherd has also gone this time. The drawing shows a simple circle
painted with a single stroke with nothing else. This state represents,
according to Yamada, “Empty and comfortable mental state beyond others’
perception, beyond time, and beyond space” (Yamada, 2009:145), and thestate where one is completely free from everything, even fromenlightenment. Dogen describes this scene as,” Learning Buddhism refers
to learning self, learning self refers to forgetting self, and forgetting self
applies for every phenomenon” (Dogen, 1990:54). The process ofmastering Buddhism is the one of mastering self where is the placebeyond self, and one can reach when and only when one forgets self.
Related to this, Izutsu discusses Eastern nothingness is “full of being. Itcannot be identified to anything constrained because it is so full” (Izutsu,
2014b:107). It is fulfilled because it is nothing. As I mentioned, theseventh drawing looks to be completed. However, we should be carefulthat completion means to stop, and it is contradict the view of “Shogyo
Mujo（ 諸 行 無 常 ） ” that everything keeps changing. This is called“Tengu-Zen,” meaning that one is obsessed to reach enlightenment(Tasato, 1973:8).
The ninth drawing is “Henpon-kangen (返 本 還 源 ), meaning returning
to the origin, back to the source. River streaming, flowers and tree
alongside, and nature are drawn in the figure. In Japanese, nature (自 然 )is pronounced “ Shizen” or “Jinen,” meaning the state that“spontaneously(=自 ) certain (=然 ) ” beyond human will and activities.
(Suzuki, 1997:219). This world happens to emerge when one abandon
his/her will and it represents “Shikisoku-zeku, Kusoku-zeshiki (色 即 是
空

空 即 是 色 ),” meaning the beginning of the new world fromnothingness. Dogen’s waka-style poem, “Comfortable with flower inspring, cuckoo in summer, moon in autumn, and snow in winter (春 は 花
夏 ほ と と ぎ す 秋 は 月 冬 雪 さ え て す ず し か り け り )”(Matsumoto,2005:14) describes the scene that one is integrated withmother nature.
The tenth on is “Nitten-suishu (入 鄽 垂 手 ),” meaning “entering thecity with bliss-bestowing hand.” Ten(鄽 ) means a town, “suishu” means
to give a hand for people, and to help them in everyday life. It is seen
young and old men meeting on the street in a town. This is “Yugi-zanmai(遊 戯 三 昧 )” (Akizuki, 1989:86) that one enjoys to help others in therelationship between self and others, now here is this stage with nodistinction between self and others called “Jita-Funi (自 他 不 二 ) .” This
is “Bosatsu-gyo” of Kwannon (the Goddess of Mercy.), meaning awaking
people to become a disciple of Buddha, toward the true value of Zen
which emphasizes practice in daily life, that is to say, “a wiser person

would hide in mountain, the wisest person would live in town.”

Suzukiargues that the true value of Buddhism is, “Wisdom and mercy” (Suzuki,
1987:15). This drawing also describe that one is seeking, practicing anddeveloping mercy.
We have reviewed each of “Ten Cow’s Figure.” It can be summarized
in one word as 1: seek, 2: understand, 3: find, 4: capture, 5: tame, 6:
devolve, 7: release, 8: transcend, 9: certain, and 10: practice. This can be
categized as three phases starting from the state where he was unawarethat he has been lost, beginning to seek consciously, capturing the cow(Jin-gyu-Toku-gyu), releasing persistence to tame the cow, forgetting thecow (Boku-gyu-Bogyu-zonjin), beyond consciousness even the self
disappearing, and finally coming back to home (Ningyu-guboNitten-suishu). As shown in Fiture1, there can be also as four dimensions
with the vertical line representing conscious-unconscious, the horizontal
line with persistence-emancipation: “Unaware” with unconscious,
persistence and unaware that you are lost, “Ignorance of knowledge” withconsciously aware of persistence, “Master” with consciousness but free,and “free man” with unconsciously free (Figure 1). Moreover, these ten
scenes are applicable for not only self-awareness but also other’sawareness and social awareness. According to the above review, we foundthe core that we first need to seek and desperately devote, then maketransition to release persistence, and finally having fun like playing inorder to proceed steps of these scenes.

Figure1: The Four-Dimension Development Model of Ten Cow’s Figure

4． Application of Ten Cow’s Figure
Here, I introduce a case of mid-sized company’s project of vision sharing
and discuss the process of organizational change along with Ten Cow’s
Figure. This “Company A” has been 10 plus several years since founded,
has listed company’s stocks, and obtained a certain reputation in theirbusiness area. However, the CEO always has been feeling “Something iswrong.”The meeting used to be full of exciting discussion and debate, but
now it is just sophisticated presentations with Q&A. The number of new
project proposal has decreased resulting in no break-through new productin several years. It seems that workers become more secure-oriented.
More importantly, they seem to focus only on own section’ work, butshows no interest on other sections’ work. The CEO encouraged them as“Do challenging work, be aggressive,” but few workers responded, hegets angry for them and himself.
The CEO called in the meeting “Let’s recall our basic policy, thenlet’s create together our vision to clarify what we want to be, how wewant to do our business.” The project launched under direct supervisionby the CEO. However, most of board committee members felt that thisproject would not be successful even though they also share some anxiety
for the company’s future. Thus, at this moment, no committee member
committed.
The committee member changed when they found a lot of newworkers left the company. They shared sense of impending crisis when
one committee member from HR division said, “The more problem
conscious and ambitious workers, the more they tend to leave thecompany.” The members had a concentrate camp to discuss it. In an
isolated lodge in a forest, each member spent time to face him/her selfalone, and then shared with what he/she felt and found many times. They
depended on Ten Cow’s Figure as a guidance with a basic model that “godeeper into self as being,” ⇒ ”realize own feelings and passions,”⇒ ”emerge strong willingness to progress.”
They tried to sit calmly, repeating deep breath to find problems
inside of themselves and to release own persistence. Since this camp,they felt “to understand self and each other with dramatically deep level,”
resulting in sharing the situation as own problem, and boosting the
project (1: Jin-gyu, seek). The project members also repeatedly had
meetings. They prioritized to ask themselves on self and being before
discussing strategy and method. By doing this, they were able tounderstand each other through keeping asking who they were, what theimportant thing for them was, and what they wanted to achieve in the
project.
First, they studied other companies’ cases of vision creation as wellas understood current situation of own company to develop sharedconsciousness（ ”2: Ken-seki”(understand)） . They then started hearing
from ex-workers and current workers about episodes and stories thatcharacterize own company. By doing this, they found that a lot of
workers are much more passionate on the job than they expected, and a
lot of workers desperately want “to change their feeling of helplessness”
w i t h c o n s t r u c t i v e s e n s e o f c r i s i（
s ” 3 : K e n - g y u ” ( f i n d ) ）. A l s o b y d o i n g t h i s ,there was another change that the project members came to love in thecompany again. However, these passion was shared only by the project
members, not by all the workers in the company (“4:Toku-gyu”(capture)） .
They continued hearing from many workers. Talking about own
company, many workers started to review the company, and they also
shared the passion for the company with the project members
They proposed, in the board committee meeting, the idea that they
make video clips of these episodes and have an event to share with all
the workers in the company for boosting this trend. Some committee
members were not positive because the company had never held “theevent for all participation” sice at very early period with just a small
number of workers. Such committee members said their opinion, “weconcern if this event should be prioritized to daily work.” However, acommittee member said the critical opinion, “I still do not know, but I
want to believe in the project members. Let’s do it.” After the video clip
event, they held meetings of vision creation by divisions several times（ ”5:Boku-gyu” (tame)） . After each worker and each division createdown vision, they clarified their activity to reflect the vision to practice.
The project members said “I really enjoy this job even though this isvery tough,” “I cannot remember how I devote myself so much to the job
i n t h e p a s t ”（ ” 6 : K i g y u - k i k a ” ( d e v o l v e ) ）.

It happened that the initiativeof vision project was shifted from the project members to works indivisions and sub-divisions. For example, R&D division decided toadopt open-source development for a new service (“7: Bogyu-zonjin”(release)).

Currently. Company A tries to habituate vision reflection activity
among workers in daily meetings, products development, recruiting, andhuman resource developmen（t ” 8 : J i n g y u - k u b o ” ( t r a n s c e n d ) ）. T h e y w i l l t r y
to create new products and new services for their clients and customers,
and internally try to develop new norms and institutional regulations (“9:Henpon-kangen” (certain)). They will also proceed to the next step for
future generation to inherit and share the vision (“10: Nitten-suishu”(practice)). It is still a long way to go, the workers certainly became
vital and energized compared to the before-project state.

5． Conclusion
From the point of view in Buddhism philosophies that everything ischanging, I try to utilize Ten Cow’s Figure to discuss organizational
development, which hardly implementable with conventional ways andstrategies. Changing is always difficult. It is especially daunting task fororganization to guide toward better direction because organization must
deal with contradictory missions in uncertain situation such as“immediate sales and human resource development in the long term,”“customer service and internal arrangement,” and “promoting diversityof members and encouraging the same activity.” However, I, as aconsultant to help organizational development for years, surely argue
that it is possible for anybody to develop their understandings widely anddeeply, and it is possible for any organization to find the way forchanging full of hopelessness to rich and vital.
I confirmed that the most important thing for change is notexternally, but internally emerged willingness and passion to explore
who I am, how I am, and what I do as the reflection of the true self. It isnecessary to have internal passion from characteristics of life and tohave insight and creativity based on belief. I also confirmed that Ten
Cow’s Figure, a method for self-awareness, gives us insightful

suggestions. It implies that you can find the way to go by experiencing
your origin. When you do it, first devote yourself, release yourpersistence, and finally play and have fun with hardness. The willingness
is the key to make it possible. In the world of “Shogyo-mujo (諸 行 無 常 ),”all things must pass, I find that change give us possibility for future
although change has some risk.
The last drawing of Ten Cow’s Figure is “Nitten-suish (入 鄽 垂 手 ),”meaning practicing altruism in daily life. This drawing actuallydescribes the same scene of town as the first drawing “Jin-gyu,” meaning
seeking for the lost cow, namely the true self.

It gives us a surprisingand deep finding that the paradise is not far from here, but is in our daily
life as gifted and miracle. This world can emerge when and only when werelease our persistence and we transform our recognition. In this world,
we overcome dichotomy between two, such as self and others, observer
and observed target, and forcer and forced one. We can go beyond ournarrow frame that we used to set by ourselves because of our persistence.
This transcend refers to the ultimate finding and awaking. This is theworld with no dichotomy of self and others, where we practice altruism
not obligately nor forcibly, but playfully with fun. The meaning of
awaking refers to keep going, even though the way to reach such a worldis not easy（ Komoriya, 2014） .
Henry Mintzberg gave his message to Japanese business persons at aconference in Japan, 2013, “In my opinion, Japan has the US disease(blindly follow US way). Japan should not learn from US. Japan should
learn from the nature of Japan.”3 Izutsu also points out,” When modern
Japanese take the topics of Eastern philosophical theme to study themwith the background with modern consciousness, this activity itself makean achievement of cross-over between Eastern and Western with the
emergence of East-West encounter in the existentialism manner, namely,3

At the business forum in Tokyo, February 19th, 2013.

it is an emergence of integrated Eastern and Western philosophies.
(Izutsu, 1991:414-5). It might be a mission for Japan to investigate a new
management way utilizing Eastern philosophy because Japan, located in
the far East, has been deeply affected by Western culture.
Lastly, I would like to note on further direction of this study. It isnecessary to collect more number of cases on companies. I have also
started to study how the analytical frame with Ten Cow’s Figure can leadto measurable achievement. Further data collection and more precise
analysis should be needed in the future.

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