Managing the People Who Know
By Thomas Boatman
Published in the ACCJ Journal
You
want to hate Simon Laight. How does a man who, by his own admission,
is technologically challenged, become the managing director of Tokyo's
most exciting interactive company? Yet, he has the job, plus those
good looks and that smile.
He makes it very difficult to feel negative. There doesn't seem to be a pretentious bone in his body. Maybe nice guys don't finish last after all. Laight holds the reins at the Tokyo office (in business less than a year) of The Web Connection (TWC), which began in 1995 as a Web solutions company, but today is part of a burgeoning network that includes the portal sites china.com, hongkong.com and taiwan.com and the interactive media company 24/7 Media Asia. Perhaps Laight's youthful exuberance is fueled by the notion that he and his team are positioned to cash in on what will someday be the world's most lucrative interactive-business market outside the U.S. That is, of course, if Japan Inc. ever wises up to the fact that Web business is real business.
"Fragmented," is how Laight describes Japan's Web business today. "Whenever we bid on a project we're up against a mixed bag of companies that might range from Andersen Consulting to a two-man Web-design shop," he says. Through TWC, Laight is pushing every facet of interactive service, including designing Web sites, developing e-commerce strategies, and offering IT consulting and integrated marketing and media plans. TWC even has a venture-capital arm called JumpStart, which provides financing and consulting for small or medium sized dot.coms.
After graduating from Ontario's University of Guelph with a double major in Canadian Politics and History, he back-packed around the world for three years and wound up in England. When he eventually grew tired of tending bar in West Sussex, he headed back to Canada looking for direction. His mother gave him a sock on the jaw and reminded him of his forgotten desire to live in Japan. He applied to Geos English school in 1992 and was soon an integral part of Tokyo's English-language industry. His natural business talents shone through and he found himself doing recruiting and helping to schedule the other teachers.
Then Laight had a revelation. He had been hiring too many 35-year-old university graduates from Canada and didn't want to see himself end up that way. So he started networking around Tokyo's foreign business community and eventually joined the Japan Market Entry Competition, JMEC. After arriving at the JMEC awards ceremony very late and nervously drinking a little too much red wine, Laight went out for some air. A woman bummed a smoke off him, they started chatting and she was joined by her husband, Terry Lloyd, founder of LINC Media, and Computing Japan magazine (now J@panInc .) . Back then, Lloyd was at the vanguard of Internet-related business in Japan.
"So when Terry found out I was an English teacher he started ribbing me, and he ultimately said, "If you ever want a real job, give me a call," says Laight.
Laight started in sales at LINC Media in 1996, when there were eight employees. He had an inauspicious beginning. Turning on his PC and not seeing a Mac-like graphic interface he promptly reported it broken, to the amusement of the other staff.
A year ago, The Web Connection bought out LINC's Web business. Laight now admits that he's usually the 'dummy test' for TWC's projects. He has a knack for finding bugs or using a site in ways that have not been considered.
"Normally, I manage people who know far more about what they're doing than I," says Laight. But he enjoys his role.
"One of the main weaknesses of most major companies is that they are formulated around poor performers," says Laight. "Rules are made to compensate for the incompetent. I'd rather encourage more stars to shine than lower our standards toward the weak end of the curve."
As the only foreigner in management at TWC, Laight has the difficult task of keeping happy the young, entrepreneurial-minded workers, who are nothing like their blue-suited fathers. He seems to relish this role most. "I want people at TWC to know that they can grow with the company," says Laight. "I believe we should help people develop the skills they need to achieve what they want, even if that means going solo somewhere down the road."
