The Best of the Best Encore: Wolfgang Angyal, President of Riedel Japan, Episode #47 Japan's Top Business Interviews

Wolfgang Angyal, President of Riedel Japan, originally grew up in
Austria and came to Japan in 1985 as an Austrian representative
in restaurant service sector of the 28th WorldSkills Competition
and won first place. He credits this win to the trust he had of
his supporting team who were all Japanese. Mr. Angyal has also
been practicing Judo from a young age where he developed a deep
respect and fascination for Japanese culture.


After working in the education sector as an instructor in Japan,
Mr. Angyal became interested in working for Riedel as he was
familiar with the brand due to his experience in the hospitality
industry in Austria. Through persistency, Mr. Angyal met with
Georg Riedel, the owner of Riedel, and secured a business
development role for a subsidiary company. There, he was able to
apply the skills he had gained working in hospitality and event
management to promote Riedel products to Japanese restaurants and
companies.  


Staying true to the Riedel family motto of “stoke the fire, don’t
save the ashes,” Mr. Angyal persistently approached restaurants
to promote Riedel. Fortunately, this was the 80s economic boom
time in Japan, and Mr. Angyal used his networks to successfully
schedule appointments to meet restaurant owners in person. “I
think a lot of them actually bought their first [wine] glasses,
more out of pity, [thinking] this guy's sweating with this case,
coming to the restaurant and waiting for two hours. Or some of
them maybe were admiring the effort.” Mr. Angyal worked to
establish the brand within companies to build relationships with
large scale distributions.


Mr. Angyal states the main challenge for him at the time was
introducing wine culture to those who were not familiar with
drinking wine on a daily basis. Therefore, Mr. Angyal actively
promoted the product by holding tasting sessions where people got
to experience drinking wine from Riedel glasses. “If you taste
the difference, it's experiential. If you taste the difference
between [a Riedel glass] and another glass of drinking the same
beverage, you will never forget it.”


Mr. Angyal then moved his base to Australia where he worked from
Riedel’s Sydney office as the Vice President of Asia Pacific,
Latin America and Southern Hemisphere. After a brief
consideration of moving to China, Mr. Angyal was persuaded by an
old friend to move back to Japan in 2000 where he has been since
then, working as the President & CEO of Riedel Japan.


By 2000, Riedel Japan had become an independent operation and Mr.
Angyal started to build his team through referrals to recruit
staff. As a leader, Mr. Angyal found challenges in driving the
operation side of the organization and establishing a shared
vision while going through an acquisition. In order to maintain
employee engagement during the merger, Mr. Angyal organized
workshops, off-site meetings and external coaching. Additionally,
Mr. Angyal worked to get to know his staff through open
communication and personality tests. By better understanding his
staff, Mr. Angyal adjusted his communication style and worked to
form a more trusting relationship. Mr. Angyal notes that as a
foreign leader, he is mindful of being consistent with his
decision-making and tries to be predictable with his actions. He
claims that constantly asking the questions “How do they see us
and what do they expect from us?” is key to leading in Japan as a
foreigner.


Additionally, Mr. Angyal values open communication and provides
equal opportunities for his staff to be heard even if this means
rejecting his own ideas in public. Mr. Angyal also seeks to bring
different perspectives and ideas from his global networks and to
his Japanese team in order to provide the “right fuel for their
sparks.” He also has his immediate reports give him a 360 degree
performance review to continue developing his leadership
abilities and maintain transparency.


Riedel Japan has come up with innovation such as creating sake
glasses, an idea that came out of a tasting workshop from a
customer. Currently, the Japan office has independently come up
with two different sake glasses - the Daiginjo glasses and Junmai
glasses - by working with hundreds of brewers and testing in
multiple workshops to come up with the perfect product.


For newcomers in Japan, Mr. Angyal advises to be patient and
mindful of one’s actions as well as words. He recommends having
small wins first and then building on that to quickly gain trust
and credibility. Lastly, he advises to be authentic and to be
yourself to be able to survive leading in Japan in the long term.