ニック 
稲盛和夫氏（京セラとKDDIの創業者、JALの名誉会長）は、人の心はうつろいやすく変わりやすいものと言われますが、また同時にこれほど強固なものもないのです、と述べられています。（出典：京セラフィロソフィ）
これは非常に深みのある言葉だ。実際、私も飲食店の経営者として、従業員に裏切られたり、従業員の身勝手な振る舞いにがっかりさせられたりしたことは何度もあるが、従業員に助けられたことも、数え切れないくらいある。特に起業したばかりの頃は、何の実績もなく、賃金水準も低く、仕事の段取りも悪く、お客さんもほとんど来ず、無い無い尽くしだったので、従業員の定着率は非常に悪かった。当初は、従業員の足りないところに目が行きがちで、そこを改善することが従業員のためにも、経営のためにもなると考えていたが、離職率の高さと業績の低さを見ると、それで経営がうまく行っているとは思えなかった。数年後、懸命の努力の甲斐があって、当社の業績が伸び始め、信頼して仕事を任せられる従業員がもっと必要になって来た頃、私は従業員の離職率の高さを何とか改善したいと考え、自分の従業員への接し方を変えてみることにした。
まず、私は小さなことに拘らないようにし、従業員がやるべきことを正しくやってくれたときには、例えそれが、ルーチンワークであっても、彼らに感謝の言葉をかけるようにした。すると、私からの細かな指示が減ったにも関わらず、オペレーションが通常通りうまく回っていることに気が付いた。それに加えて、従業員の定着率が徐々に高まって来た。この背景については、私からの指示が減ったため、私と従業員双方のストレスが減ったからだと考えている。これにより従業員の仕事の裁量が少し増えた。また、私がベストと思う仕事の進め方と従業員の仕事の進め方が少し違う場合でも、従業員のやり方に任せるようにしてみたところ、効率アップが図れたこともあったし、何よりも社長から信頼されていると感じた従業員の仕事への取り組みがより積極的になり、職場における満足感が高まったようだった。
この経験以降、私は従業員とよく対話をし、経営にも出来る限り彼らの意見を取り入れるようにしてきた。その結果、スタッフが育ち、お店の経営も安定し、業績も大きく伸ばすことができた。やはり頼りになるのは従業員であり、まずは従業員を信頼し、彼らに仕事を任せることのできる、経営者としての度量の広さが大切だと、今では確信している。
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Vol.35 Management based on mind
Kazuo Inamori (Founder of Kyocera and KDDI, Honorary Chairman of JAL) is saying that people’s mind is sometimes changeable and not reliable, but at the same time, there is nothing else as strong as the mind you can rely on. (Source: Kyocera Philosophy)
This is a very insightful phrase. In fact, as a restaurant owner, I have often been betrayed by my employees and disappointed by their selfish behavior, but there have been countless times that they have helped me. Especially when I just started up the business, I had no record of achievement, the wage level was low, the work setup was bad, we had much less customers a day, and I was inexperienced in terms of management, so the retention rate of employees was very poor. At first, I tended to care about employee mistakes, and I thought that improving them would benefit both the employees and management. However, because of the fact that we had high turnover rate and poor performance, it was obvious that my business was not going well in the beginning. A few years later, as a result of hard work, the performance of my restaurant business began to grow, and when I needed more employees, I really wanted to improve the employee turnover rate. Therefore, I modified the way I deal with the employees.
First of all, I decided not to stick to small points, and I thanked my employees every time they did a good job even if it was a routine work for them. Then I noticed that the operation was going well as usual, despite of the less instructions from me. In addition, the retention rate of the employees has gradually increased. I think this is because both I and my employees reduced our stress thanks to less instructions. This means the employee’s work discretion has increased slightly. Even if the way I think the best and the way my employees want to do are slightly different, I let the employees do it in their way. As a result, I found there were some cases where we could improve our efficiency, and moreover, employees who felt they were trusted started working proactively. It seemed their satisfaction in the workplace was fulfilled a little more than before.
Since this experience, I have had a lot of conversations with my employees and tried to incorporate their opinions as much as possible. As a result, staff grew and became more reliable, the store management became more stable, and the business performance improved significantly. Now I am convinced that it is important to trust people and leave them with a wide range of responsibilities as my trustworthy team members.
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