Five years have quickly passed since the establishment of the company, and I have finally received the financial statements for the previous fiscal year. Since the summer of 2021, sales plummeted, causing me to lose confidence as a business owner and feel anxious about my livelihood. Over the course of more than three years, I managed to turn the company around to the point of what is commonly referred to as a ‘V-shaped recovery.’ This time, I would like to write about the changes in my mindset during this period. (The graph below shows the year-over-year sales growth rate from the second to the fifth year).

I may have written about this before on my blog or LinkedIn, but I feel the biggest mindset change was letting go of the need to “I have to…” In the first three years, I constantly put pressure on myself, thinking, “I achieved great success in new business development at Rakuten, so I must achieve even greater success,” or “Since I went through the trouble of moving to Nagano, I have to bring my mission and vision to life.” For the next three years, my mindset shifted to, “It doesn’t matter whether I succeed or fail. I will live without regrets in all aspects of my life, including parenting and hobbies, and whatever happens, happens! If things don’t work out, I’ll deal with it then.” This change allowed me to approach both business and personal life with more mental ease.

Additionally, I made it a point to clearly prioritize “trust relationships over immediate sales” with a ratio of 10:0. For the survival and growth of the company, there were times when I continued to engage with people or companies despite feeling deep down that they were not trustworthy. However, I decided to stop spending time with anyone, inside or outside the company, with whom I couldn’t build a trusting relationship. This sometimes meant that years of effort came to nothing, but it significantly reduced my mental stress.

Given my extreme personality, I’m not sure if this mindset shift will be helpful to other entrepreneurs, but I would be pleased if it encourages you to consider that “running a business by naturally cherishing what truly matters, without worrying about others’ opinions, might not be so bad after all.”

Masaki “Mark” Iino
Founder & CEO
SOPHOLA, Inc