Leverages Inc. Representative Director Tomohide Iwatsuki

You only live once, so make a positive impact on the world.

Representative Director of Leverages Inc.　Tomohide Iwatsuki(Tomohide Iwatsuki)

■ Profile
Born in 1980 in Izumi City, Osaka Prefecture.
After enrolling in the School of Social Sciences at Waseda University, he gained business experience as an engineer at an IT company from his first year.
Upon graduating from university, he founded Leverages Inc. in 2005, where he continues to work to this day.
He also serves as a director of a group company.

Since its founding, Leverages has upheld the corporate philosophy of "pursuing the happiness of all stakeholders and promoting the growth of each individual through the creation of new customers," and has expanded into over 40 businesses to date. Leverages' CEO, Iwatsuki, who has led the company to an annual turnover of 1000 billion yen in just 19 years since its founding, says he has worked hard to create businesses with a strong will, based on his formative experiences as a student. We spoke in detail about the secret to the company's rapid growth and the behind-the-scenes success of his career, business, and organization.

■ Struggling with money and work during college

　I'm originally from Osaka Prefecture and moved to Tokyo when I enrolled in university. While I always wanted to start my own business, I didn't have a clear goal or plan. However, while I was in college, my father's business failed, and I suddenly found myself struggling financially. My parents' financial support decreased, and I was racking up debt and working part-time jobs day in and day out. When I thought about how I could earn more, I decided I needed to hone my skills and find a job that would help me in the future. I then began self-studying programming and interned at several companies while in college. It was the era of the Internet bubble, when IT companies were booming and various business leaders were in the spotlight. I read many books by entrepreneurs during my time at university. I was deeply inspired by the life of Andrew Carnegie, the "Steel King," and strongly felt that since I only had one life, I wanted to create an incredibly big business and make a positive impact on society. After graduating from university, I founded Leverages, which I've continued to run ever since.

■ The moment when the vision was realized

　Our company was originally a systems development company. I started a personal business during my final year of university, and I used some of the 15 million yen I earned there to launch this company. It wasn't until later that I launched our current core human resources business. I struggled with money and work during my university years, so I constantly wondered if I could do something with the mission of solving problems related to money and work. It occurred to me that a human resources business could create a system that would make everyone involved happy, not just in terms of B2B but also B2C. This led to the launch of our IT human resources service, the precursor to our "RevaTech" business. I was confident that this business would be a success, leveraging my strengths in IT skills and the sales skills I'd developed through internships and other experiences. As a result, we've continued to see growth in both revenue and profits, and our business has earned the gratitude of many of our customers. It's always satisfying to see our customers happy, and it really brings home to me that our ideal of "happiness for all involved" is a reality.

■ The shortcut to growth for young people is to entrust them with big tasks　

　Our company primarily focuses on media, but also operates a variety of businesses. While our human resources business generates the largest revenue, we have recently diversified into areas such as SaaS, HR tech, and online medical consultations. Our focus on media management is to enhance management stability and profit margins. We anticipated business growth from our founding, and to achieve this goal, we operate multiple media outlets at different phases and scales, constantly improving them. As an organization, we have significantly increased our hiring numbers in line with our growth. With our business expanding rapidly, we face gaps if we don't strengthen our hiring practices. While we naturally focus on training employees after hiring, we are particularly focused on recruiting because it is difficult to change someone who doesn't meet our standards through internal training. It's said that 70% of employee development is determined by practical experience (how much work they can handle), 20% by mentoring from superiors and seniors, and the final 10% by classroom learning. This is why hiring talented people and giving them bold discretion early on leads not only to their personal growth but also to the growth of the company. In the past, there have been cases where interns were given a budget of several billion yen before they even joined the company. I believe that giving people discretion is the most important thing in the process of their growth, so I give them as much discretion as possible regardless of seniority.

■The biggest secret to a company's rapid growth

　Up until now, our company has grown rapidly through two pillars: operational improvement and marketing. By breaking down and improving sales operations, we were able to allocate budget to marketing. By continuing this cycle, we were able to increase sales. For example, if the rate from online registration to interview increases by 5%, profits will increase accordingly. By allocating the increased amount to advertising and other marketing budgets, we can increase awareness and usage among more customers. This is the idea behind repeating this cycle. Digressing from the previous topic, sales work is often mistakenly thought of as a relatively simple job, but at our company, it is a highly complex process made up of many detailed processes. This is why, since our founding, we have meticulously understood the coefficients of each process.

■Message to university students

　In any case, invest time in studying and work. As a student, you probably have plenty of free time, so I think it's a good idea to study a lot. People often say that working long hours is a "black company," but successful entrepreneurs and working adults all over the world, without exception, all work hard as a matter of course. If you want to be active in society, even if just a little, or have a big impact on society, I think it's important to first value spending a lot of time.

Student Newspaper Online, May 1, 2024, Interview by Miyu Ito, 4th year student at Keio University

Yusuke Suzuki, third year student at Hosei University / Karin Ishimatsu, first year student at Tsuda University / Miyu Ito, fourth year student at Keio University / Ryusei Nishiyama, fourth year student at Musashino University