You name it, I’ve probably recruited it.

Our company thrives on our FocusMORE values:

Master’s of teamwork

Open and dedicated to self-development

Results driven: getting shit done

Exceptional customer service

Executives

I graduated to be a high school teacher, but was working in the U.S. Government in HR and didn’t want to lose the salary, so moonlighted as a college professor. After 10 years in the government and having married a lovely Japanese woman, I moved over to Japan and landed my dream job as a high school teacher on JET for 1 year. From there, moved into recruitment.

I believe we have some of the best training in the industry. For a bit, I owned a training company that focused on training recruiters (also wrote a couple of books on the subject). That training and self-development expectation in our company is super important is why our consultants grow within our organization.

Also, I value working with people and for people. Because of that, I seldom work with companies or individuals who are transactional in nature.

Do they have the values that reflect our own company values. See FocusMORE above.

In recruitment, Lehman shock was a rough one. At the time I was running a training company for a couple of years. After Lehman, no one wanted training, so I went bankrupt. In hindsight, however, I learned a great deal and I got back into recruiting. Though it was the most difficult recruitment environment I’ve ever tackled (even worse than the 2020 Pandemic year, I believe), it really helped me grow as a recruiter and manager.

We look to grow 30%.

Some form of professional development in a university setting around executive search.

• Running FocusCore for nearly 10 years.
• Raising 2 fine sons
• Running 7 marathons in 7 days to raise money for underprivileged kids

After all this time I have a few! There was one Head of Japan I placed where the client and candidate were about 15 million Yen different in terms of budget, but because both parties were willing to work together, we all could sit down and negotiate a fair package where everyone was a winner. To assist a client to hire top talent they thought outside of their budget felt really good.

I find that those companies who partner with their vendors and build long lasting relationships tend to be those that thrive longer.

Lack of true hiring strategy by companies. In many companies, management gives the recruitment over to HR or talent acquisition without authority and so they tend to be reactive and administrative. HR or TA tend to lack the time or knowledge for a true strategy and so are reactive and administrative. It becomes a vicious cycle. It’s worth the time and money to sit down, put a proper strategy in place and follow the strategy, which is based on partnership and long-term relationships.

I’m a runaholic and put in about 100 kilometers running per week. I write poetry, am a member of a couple of reading clubs, have a podcast, and just took up playing the ukulele which seems so addictive that it’s gobbling up all my extra time.

A writer.

Tantanmen

I’ve rolled around in 300,000 warm, freshly minted pennies.