Gift and Gifted
By: Masahiro, Hiro
Tags: Mentoring, Online Coaching, Skillset, Knowledge Management, Coaching

Gift and Gifted

Coaching from Sub Zero — fighting against COVID-19 with Zoom / Autumn-Winter 2020–2021 / Week 9

View from Park Hyatt Kyoto / Credit; Hiro Nakagawa

Every day, we are watching the media telling us that year 2020 was a difficult time and most of the things which we want to forget. But humans learns the most when we are in trouble.

This autumn semester has begun well before autumn. Expecting more tightening regulation coming in autumn due to COVID 19 more spreading (I was right), our editing exercise of BA paper (graduation thesis) was started on the week 1 of August, through Zoom. At last! All 11 students submitted the paper to the college and most of them completed their presentation at the class.

Credit; Hiro Nakagawa Seminar 2020

Interestingly, current this college system does not require the seminar or paper submission mandatorily for graduation. But I take the most important matter of this paper submission to the students.

The rationale? Very simple. It is naïve to say that most of the students chose this college as their first choice, but for plan B, C, or D.

Which I do not care. No matter what had happened to the students before, once I confront these students, I treat them like my own children.

Most of the students did not have enough training for the academic work and their GPA are not so super-marked, and most of their activities tend to focus on their part-time job, not on the class.

But, thinking of them when they confront the real world, they realize the reality of job hunting. They should explore their skill set and set to present to the target company. Naturally, they explain how they improve some skills at a part-time job. But from the interviewer's point of view, these students have been judged that they did nothing at the school and consider them better to go to that part-time job place to work longer.

This COVID 19 situation cement this momentum firmer.

Thinking of ourselves. We are on the faculty of business administration at the college. Much closer to the real world. Not mandatory requesting, but I always say to the class, “At my class, the project and BA paper should be the weapon to demonstrate your skills. This should a door opener to the real world.”

The current 3-week sessions are for their presentation, and I invited our junior students and alumni of Nakagawa Zemi (most of them came from Tokyo, out of my pocket) to review them.

Mayu, Kotaro, Shiori of our Alumni contributed to ask a tough question to the presenters. Keita, Clear, Kisaki, Nanami, Kimika, Yuki, Tenma, Ayaka of Junior also set simple and tough questions.

Not only contributing their presentation, but Alumni supported to set Zoom interview at the related subject.

I believe this whole process should be a Phronesis to transfer their tacit knowledge into explicit one. My mentor calls this “Ba”, a similar pronunciation with Bar, hence our second round after the class is always at the bar or Izakaya (unfortunately we should hesitate to visit the bar until this pandemic would be terminated).

Coming back to the skill set of the students, I usually use a theatrical metaphor for their ideal positioning. It is not always happy if we ask all staff to perform as the main cast. People have their own character to fit in different positions. The main cast is good for the main cast, the bystander is for a bystander, a producer is for a producer, the stage manager is for the stage manager, a director is for a director, lighting is for lighting,,,. When I select my class, I always set my own positioning which position may fit these students and select to diversify as much as they can and never chose the same character or students who may fit the same position. This makes a great content mix at the class and they would play as they like. This scope to the student has helped me to find their skill set for job hunting as well.

My positioning? A producer from the bottom of the heart.

Hence, I am always enjoying the casting of each project and how to manage the class at every session. Every session is a stage for the student. Then, they all try to respect each other and commence to share their own values/positioning.

Christmas is the day when we remember what is the gift and how we have been gifted.

All students in front of me have been gifted in any sense, and time to remember these gifts can be enjoyed, only once shared with the others.

Wishing glory and peace, on a holy night,