Masahiro Yamada<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n After graduating from Ritsumeikan University’s Faculty of Business Administration, he worked at Chuo Mitsui Trust Bank (now Sumitomo Mitsui Trust Bank), as a strategy consultant at a major foreign consulting firm, as Head of Business Development at an IT startup, as Client Partner at a business turnaround consulting firm, and as Director and Head of Business Reform at two shoe manufacturing and retail companies before becoming Representative Director and CEO of Gemini Strategy Group Inc. (originally founded as “Strategix Partners Inc.”).<\/p>\n\n\n\n He has supported the corporate value enhancement and strategy formulation of over 100 companies.<\/p>\n\n\n\n From April 2024, he is scheduled to become a Professor of Tourism Management at the Ritsumeikan University Business School (Graduate School of Management Studies \/ MBA).<\/p>\n<\/div><\/div>\n\n\n\n We’re a firm that handles strategy and management consulting. There are two differences from general consulting firms.<\/p>\n\n\n\n One is that we directly raise operating profit and ordinary profit\u2014in other words, produce financial results. I think there are almost no consulting firms that commit to this. We don’t end with creating a strategy; we sometimes take on entire management. For example, in business turnaround cases, we dispatch executives such as Directors and COOs, and enter the field to handle operations.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Even those claiming “hands-on” support often, while taking a residential form, actually just draw Gantt charts and schedules and merely push the backs of on-site people. We, on the other hand, take on operations within the organization as executives in the form of dispatching professional executives\/teams, bearing responsibility for profit and loss. This is a decisive difference.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Another major characteristic of our company is that we’re strong in manufacturing, distribution, and retail. We’re also strong in infrastructure such as gas, IT, and digital.<\/p>\n\n\n\n For example, we pride ourselves on top-class knowledge and know-how in support for the automotive-related industry and manufacturing. We even introduce robots and advanced technology\/machinery to automate manufacturing processes, and in R&D, we even produce specific product proposals and specifications that can be commercialized. There aren’t many places that can do this. In fact, we sometimes get inquiries because other companies can’t handle them.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Because we have engineers who have built production lines at major foreign automotive manufacturers and have introduced and utilized cutting-edge machine tools. We’ve created original machine tools at Gemini, replaced all processes that humans did with machines, and operated them 24\/7. We have cases that go this far.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Beyond automotive, we have domestic top-level logistics experts in-house, so we can also take on logistics operations and execute them. Because we go all the way to real business, we can produce results. I believe this is what “hands-on” should truly be.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The important question is whether you can answer yes to “Can you produce operating profit?” For that, professional executives are needed, strategy consultants are needed, and people who can handle operations are needed. Professional executives, strategy consultants, and operational experts\u2014having these three roles in-house and being able to handle them internally is our major strength.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Besides business turnarounds, we also have many new business developments. In one dispensing pharmacy chain case, we took on the entire new business development. At that time, we dispatched a new business development manager from our side.<\/p>\n\n\n\n I think there are probably two reasons. One is that the new business plan itself is poor. Business ideas need a sense of taste.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The other is that without operational experience, you can’t guarantee feasibility and can’t envision or follow through on operations. I previously handled the development of a major hit shoe product at a major retail chain. At that time, I did everything from establishing hypotheses for product specifications to deciding the specifications. I also did customer fittings, and traveled around production sites worldwide to find optimal materials, planning, and production methods. As a result, we created over 5 billion yen in new annual revenue, and it continues to generate revenue even now, over 10 years after release.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Of course, not all new businesses succeed. However, as with serial entrepreneurs, when talented people and teams excelling in new business development skills and experience handle it, the probability of success rises significantly.<\/p>\n\n\n\n However, it may be too demanding to expect that much from general consulting firms. From my own experience as a manager, I’ve realized from the operating company perspective that there are many cases where you want deeper involvement. At Gemini, we handle business promotion and problem-solving in a more deeply committed way.<\/p>\n\n\n\n While job hunting as a university student, I decided I wanted to become someone who could solve social challenges and aim to become a professional manager in my 30s. Since I’m the type who sets specific goals before acting, I first determined the figure I should aim for and the time axis.<\/p>\n\n\n\n When deciding the goal figure and time axis, I researched American cases and found many people who were managers of listed companies in their 30s. I researched their backgrounds and General Electric (GE), which has produced famous managers with the most reproducibility in the world, and established a hypothesis: “By going through this career and acquiring these skills, I should be able to become a professional manager on a fast track.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n However, in Japan at the time, the need for manager training had just begun to be voiced during the long recession, and the environment for management talent development wasn’t ready. Thinking it would be difficult with experience from just one specific company, I planned and acted backwards from my goal figure of “professional manager in my 30s,” aiming to reach the goal through experience at several companies. I joined a bank as a new graduate, then transferred to PwC. After learning the minimum framework needed for problem-solving and strategy planning at the firm, I aimed for positions bearing P&L responsibility and making decisions. This is because without making decisions bearing P&L responsibility in positions where conflicts between departments and organizations occur while young, you can’t understand the reality of management.<\/p>\n\n\n\n I thought only startups could provide such opportunities at a young age, but at 24, even through ordinary recruitment agencies, the typical framework of experience years and age made it impossible to immediately become a business manager. So I hosted entrepreneur networking events myself to create opportunities to meet startup managers.<\/p>\n\n\n\n I positioned myself as a host because I calculated that startup managers, who constantly suffer from talent shortages, would definitely want talented people who can take initiative to host events themselves rather than passive audience members. As expected, entrepreneurs who attended approached me, and I was invited by the president of OKWAVE, a now-listed venture, to lead their software business as business manager.<\/p>\n\n\n\n I thought gaining experience at operating companies was essential career-wise for honing skills and gaining experience needed for managers. After that, I was approached by a consulting firm handling business turnarounds and hands-on management support, and there I spent about 6 years working on business turnarounds, new business development, and growth support for various companies. From there, at 32, I was approached by an investment fund and became a manager of an investee. Here I reached the entrance of my goal of becoming a professional manager in my 30s.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Through my career until then, I had acquired MBA-level knowledge and experienced various projects from strategy to business improvement to IT. But when I actually managed, things were different, and there were many things I realized I hadn’t understood. While struggling as a manager, I keenly felt that up to a certain business scale, managers must step into operations themselves as needed. I experienced various successes and failures.<\/p>\n\n\n\n When my term as a director ended, I thought about returning to a consulting firm. But reflecting on my management experience, I realized: “As a manager, you want someone who commits to numbers and executes, but there are no such people or companies.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n Major firms naturally have brand and reputation, so they don’t bear responsibility for results. If there’s no one offering such services, I’d do it myself. Although I initially had no plan to start a business, I ended up launching my own.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Roughly, 60-70% are major corporations, and 30-40% are mid-caps or below (under 100 billion yen). This ratio is intentionally balanced.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Major corporate projects have relatively well-defined scope, high requirement levels, and tight deadlines. Therefore, they’re suitable for fostering orthodox problem-solving theory and project management skills. On the other hand, support for mid-cap and smaller companies depends on the theme, but more flexible response is often required, and you can develop very practical business response, agility, and flexibility.<\/p>\n\n\n\n To use an analogy, major corporate projects are where you practice “kata” (forms) like in karate or judo, while many mid-cap and below projects are practical application. From the perspective of training problem-solving professionals, the ideal is to experience both while gauging order and timing.<\/p>\n\n\n\n However, achieving high quality in both forms and practice takes a certain amount of time, and focusing on performance in the immediate project, there are limits to what one person can do alone. We think it’s important to raise individual skills and proficiency through study and training while complementing necessary functions and roles as a team in projects. Timing depends, but we assign as much as possible considering the person’s career vision and path, so they can experience various types of projects.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Even members who joined as new graduates entered a restaurant business turnaround case immediately after joining, and at the same time also entered an energy-related company strategy case in parallel. It depends on the project and situation, but when possible, we have one person work on multiple projects. Handling parallel projects of different types like comprehensive management support and strategy is demanding, but in terms of having to switch heads in the short term and produce output based on completely different skills and knowledge, the experiences and insights gained are many. So even young people work on various projects, large and small.<\/p>\n\n\n\n “I want to do this, I want to do that” “I want to grow as a true problem-solving professional as quickly as possible”<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u2014For those with high intellectual curiosity and growth orientation, I think this is a very good environment.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Being able to experience both major firm work and operating company work is a strength. At firms, you can learn forms, but in many cases they don’t step into execution, so the experience and career tend to be biased toward continuous planning.<\/p>\n\n\n\n You can learn forms like at a major firm, acquire problem-solving reproducibility, and also handle real business, experiencing live business and bearing business responsibility. There aren’t many companies where you can do both.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Without fear of misunderstanding, our vision is “to become\/develop reproducible business people.” You might think you could just start your own company, but companies are living things, and you can leverage the unique characteristics and strengths each company has to grow the business. Still, taking on various challenges here is very interesting, and I think there are many returns.<\/p>\n\n\n\n One young employee once told me, “Recent young people are more interested in DX than business turnaround or management” (laughs), but we handle cutting-edge DX initiatives too. For the retail industry, we provide an in-house developed SaaS platform for core operations, enabling automation and efficiency from merchandising to product procurement, planning, and sales. To transform a company today, digital means are essential. At Gemini, we have abundant projects utilizing digital, including DX.<\/p>\n\n\n\n We have 30 employees, or about 50 including business contractors. Women make up about 30%, and we want to increase to about 50%. At Gemini, there’s absolutely no gender difference in opportunities or treatment. With many consumer goods projects in apparel, cosmetics, drugstores, sweets, and food, there are many opportunities to maximize uniquely female sensibilities.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Mid-career hiring is the main focus, but we also do new graduate hiring. We’ve just started recently, with one new graduate now and two coming next year. We plan to hire 5-10 per year thereafter.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Of course. One barrier for operating company alumni is hypothesis thinking and logical thinking. Practicing these two ways of thinking is essential: “Assuming this is the case, isn’t this proposal good?” or “Having designed the equation leading to problem-solving (the goal), what if we change this variable?”<\/p>\n\n\n\n Simply put, people with purpose-driven thinking and high growth motivation. Among purpose-driven people, some want to solve social challenges, some want to do business or manage. There are also various axes like wanting to be able to do high-level problem solving. Regardless, people with high growth motivation are suitable.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Of course, work-life balance is important. But if you want to become or are becoming a problem-solving professional, I want to work with people who don’t have the sense of “providing labor hours” but want to focus on their own work responsibility and results and raise the level of their output.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Yes. Ultimately, learning and growth at professional firms\u2014whether major firms or mid-sized firms\u2014is determined by whether you can meet “capable people” and work with them. It was the same for me. Meeting people I truly thought were “amazing (professional talent)” and being influenced by them became a factor determining my subsequent career and market value as a professional. To raise individual market value, it’s not “where you were” but “who you were with, who you learned from.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n We’re still at what’s called a boutique scale, but we’re a small elite group with members who served as representatives of major PE funds, partner-class members of major firms, professional managers, and experts with top-class knowledge and achievements globally or domestically in specific areas. So we can always work with first-class members in each field. I think this is a major strength.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The most meaningful work, the best colleagues (who you respect and who are better than you in their individual fields), and the best compensation. With these three bests, I’m confident top-level professional talent will gather. Gemini’s work has many of the most important cases for shareholders (investors) and managers, so it’s meaningful and interesting, and I’m confident the colleagues are the best. We’ve set compensation at the same level as major firms, and our personnel system evaluates skills and capabilities defined in detail and concretely in a transparent way, with that evaluation linked to compensation. This is an advanced and fair evaluation\/compensation system within the consulting industry.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Strategy consulting, investment, and SaaS (IP\/services based on our know-how)\u2014these are our three arrows, and additionally we’re working on management talent development. Last year, we launched a service called “TillCareer” as a “women’s management talent development program,” and we’ve been providing this program since 2023. Currently, with multiple management talents from Gakken Holdings as targets, in the form of practical management training, Gemini’s professional managers and strategy consultants are involved in solving actual management issues.<\/p>\n\n\n\n As mentioned before, to raise profits at operating companies, words like hands-on or running-alongside aren’t enough. We need to handle business promotion and problem-solving in a more deeply committed way. Not just from the perspective of supporting from strategy to execution, but among the three functions and roles companies need\u2014”managers (professional managers),” “advisors (strategy consultants),” and “practitioners (operational experts)”\u2014we need to complement and fill the areas and positions the company lacks. In particular, professional managers are overwhelmingly insufficient in Japan. Rather than waiting for such people to naturally emerge, we’re doing this with the desire that Gemini itself will develop them.<\/p>\n\n\n\n From the world’s view, we fall into the category of so-called “consulting company,” but we pride ourselves on creating and providing unique value in committing to raising corporate value. Whatever the difficulty, we want to be an entity that can raise the top line and break through the management issues and walls each company holds. We’re walking step by step, building up the capabilities and achievements needed to realize that.<\/p>\n\n\n\n I felt the awe of being a professional management group from CEO Yamada’s resolute stance of “committing to results in terms of profit.” The thorough hands-on approach\u2014not ending with strategy planning but entering the field as a director and bearing P&L responsibility\u2014is the essence of this company that other companies can’t imitate. The environment where even young people experience both major corporations and SMEs and aim for “reproducible business people” at the shortest distance is extremely luxurious.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Through the interview, it became clear that they seek people with high growth motivation who want to change their lives based on “who they learned from” rather than “where they were.” The environment of this company, which advocates the “three bests”\u2014the highest peak of problem-solving ability, first-class colleagues, and the best compensation\u2014will be an unparalleled place of training for professionally-oriented people who want to bet their lives on the results of their own work. If you want to learn real “management” firsthand and become an entity capable of breaking through difficult situations, real teachers are gathered here.<\/p>\n\n\n\n ConsulNext \/ <\/strong>Senior Consultant<\/strong>The decisive difference from other companies: not just strategy planning but also taking on management and operations, committing to results<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
![\"Masahiro](\"https:\/\/mirai-works.co.jp\/consulnext\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/11\/company-gsg-01.jpg\")
<\/figure>\n\n\n\n\u2500\u2500Could you tell us about your business?<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
\u2500\u2500Why can you do this?<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
\u2500\u2500What kind of projects do you typically have?<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
\u2500\u2500Not many consulting firms handle new businesses. Even when strategy is drawn, many cases don’t go as planned.<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
Set the goal of becoming a professional manager in my 30s and accumulated the necessary experience<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
![\"Masahiro](\"https:\/\/mirai-works.co.jp\/consulnext\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/11\/company-gsg-02.jpg\")
<\/figure>\n\n\n\n\u2500\u2500Could you tell us how you came to found your company?<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
\u2500\u2500Becoming a business manager at age 24 is remarkable.<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
The best of major firms and operating companies. That’s why young people grow fast<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
![\"Masahiro](\"https:\/\/mirai-works.co.jp\/consulnext\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/11\/company-gsg-03-1.jpg\")
<\/figure>\n\n\n\n\u2500\u2500What kind of clients do you typically have now?<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
\u2500\u2500Being able to do both strategy projects and comprehensive management projects is a major plus for one’s career.<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
Small elite team where you can learn directly from professionals in each field<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
![\"Masahiro](\"https:\/\/mirai-works.co.jp\/consulnext\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/11\/company-gsg-04.jpg\")
<\/figure>\n\n\n\n\u2500\u2500Could you tell us about the number of employees and gender ratio?<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
\u2500\u2500For mid-career hiring, are operating company alumni eligible?<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
\u2500\u2500Do you have an image of “the kind of person we want” for hiring?<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
\u2500\u2500With many talented people in-house, there must be much to learn?<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
\u2500\u2500Could you tell us your future outlook?<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
\n\n\n\n[Interview Postscript]<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
![\"\"](\"https:\/\/mirai-works.co.jp\/consulnext\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/11\/img-tsukada.jpg\")
<\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n
Masahito Tsukada<\/strong><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\nGemini Strategy Group Inc. Company Information<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
Company Name<\/td> Gemini Strategy Group Inc.
(Japanese: \u30b8\u30a7\u30df\u30cb \u30b9\u30c8\u30e9\u30c6\u30b8\u30fc \u30b0\u30eb\u30fc\u30d7\u682a\u5f0f\u4f1a\u793e)<\/td><\/tr>Representative<\/strong><\/td> Representative Director and CEO Masahiro Yamada<\/td><\/tr> Founded<\/strong><\/td> February 2005<\/td><\/tr> Capital<\/td> 368,765,600 yen (Capital reserve: 348,790,600 yen)<\/td><\/tr> Location<\/td> Mitsubishi Building 9F, 2-5-2 Marunouchi, Chiyoda-ku, Tokyo<\/td><\/tr> Business<\/td> Corporate\/business strategy planning, management support\/financial support\/operational support\/IT system construction support
Corporate value enhancement support through professional managers\/business division heads as resident personnel\/management team injection; manager development support
Corporate\/business investment, M&A intermediation, fundraising, and various financial advisory services
New business development\/cultivation, innovation support, cutting-edge technology introduction support, machine tool manufacturing\/introduction and other engineering support<\/td><\/tr>Main Clients<\/td> Kyushu Railway Company, Gakken Holdings Co., Ltd., Baroque Japan Limited, Hiramatsu Inc., Ministry of Economy Trade and Industry, and other major and mid-tier companies in apparel, shoes\/clothing accessories, food, cosmetics, mail order, department stores\/chain stores, GMS, supermarkets, restaurants, finance, and various consumer goods; major and mid-tier companies in automotive, molds, precision equipment, medical devices, packaged software; non-profit organizations; domestic\/foreign\/government-affiliated private equity funds<\/td><\/tr><\/tbody><\/table><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n Gemini Strategy Group Inc. Job Opening Information<\/h2>\n","protected":false},"featured_media":4035,"template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"swell_btn_cv_data":""},"tags":[],"class_list":["post-7849","industry","type-industry","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","hentry"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\n