106: Jan Babatz, President, Guhring Japan

Jan Babatz currently is the President and CEO of Gurhing in
Tokyo, Japan. Mr. Babatz was born and brought up in Berlin,
Germany, on the East side of the Berlin Wall. In High School, Mr.
Babatz learned Japanese which was quite unusual at the time.
After graduating from a Business Engineering background, Mr.
Babatz started working as a Sales Engineer, before stepping into
a leadership role as General Manager at Waldrich Siegen GmbH
Japan. In 2017, he took on his current role as CEO of Gurhing
Japan.


 


In terms of getting the team to come up creative ideas and
solutions, Mr. Babatz is not a fan of big meetings as they aren’t
efficient to get creative ideas, he feels meetings are good for
making announcements. Creativity is fueled in smaller working
groups of 2-3 people. In the beginning, he tried getting down at
the team level and tried to work as a salesperson with the
others, but this didn’t go well as people were nervous working
closely with the CEO and President and clients weren’t
comfortable either. In each department, he figured out which
people had which strengths and weaknesses by getting to know
people outside of work through lunches and non-work activities
such as karaoke. Mr. Babatz says that coming down to their level
by talking about his personal life and bonding with them instead
of acting like their boss works well in improving efficiency. Mr.
Babatz further explains that most of the time when he talks to
people one by one, he always asks them what their aim is in the
next 5 years. In many cases, after these conversations, Mr.
Babatz will try to fulfill his employees’ goals.


 


By improving work culture, Mr. Babatz claims that it leads to
retention of good employees. Thus, he takes culture building
seriously. Mr. Babatz admits that creating culture within Japan
that is outside the head office can be different, and that he can
only talk about his own office of about 30 people, but there,
they hold social activities such as barbeques and play softball.
Additionally, at his office, employees are free to to take
vacations whenever they like and everyone who wants to try
something new or different always get that chance. If the staff
feel that they can share their opinion freely and are able to
take vacation flexibly, their motivation and engagement within
the company increases. Mr. Babatz emphasizes open communication,
and this also leads to high staff retention. Since hierarchy is
more defined in Japan than the west, Mr. Babatz is also mindful
of calling each other by name instead of job positions, in order
to break down the barrier between himself and the other
employees.


 


Mr. Babatz would advise new foreign leaders working in Japan to
learn Japanese. He has seen people who learn Japanese quickly by
practicing every day are much better off than those who use a
translator or interpreter. He emphasizes that speaking even a
little bit of Japanese builds a bond with clients and other
locals. Mr. Babatz also says to keep close contact and find
support within one’s team by inviting them to events and being
open about oneself. For example, Mr. Babatz brought in German
beer which he shared with his colleagues. By doing something
unique like sharing his own culture, Mr. Babatz says he was able
to build a more trusting relationship with his team.