Work One-Third the Time, Earn Three Times as Much

Currently, I spend my days quietly running the company I started in my twenties while writing this Porsche blog. When I say I “started a company in my twenties” or “chose a life outside of traditional organizations,” people often ask, “Did your parents run a business or company too?” but that’s absolutely not the case.

I grew up in a typical family with a salaried father and a stay-at-home mother. My father was hardworking and serious, and I remember him often saying things like, “When you start working, you have to work three times harder than others” and “Effort never betrays you.”

From a young age, my father was often on business trips or working overtime, and by the time I was in junior high, he was living apart from us for work. I don’t have many memories of spending time or playing with him; I mostly remember him always busy in a suit.

That said, I didn’t view his busy life negatively. Even as a child, I thought:

That’s what working means. To get paid, you have to work hard from morning till night.

I accepted that as just how things were.

Also, during college, my seniors at part-time jobs often told me, “You won’t have time once you become a working adult, so travel while you can” and “Student days are the best,” so I believed that once I became a working adult, I’d be busy with no free time.

When I finally joined the workforce, I was assigned to sales and spent my first few years in a tough, competitive environment where hard work and grit ruled.

Back then, I worked desperately. Overtime was normal, working on holidays if results weren’t good was expected, and the more hours you put in, the better your results—and your pay and bonuses—would be.

I only got long breaks during New Year’s, so I planned overseas trips from summer, bought early-bird tickets, and traveled abroad with friends every New Year’s. I thought, this is normal, this is what being a working adult means.

Later, at 27, I became independent and met my husband. He had already been running his own company for several years and often said things like:

There’s a common idea that making money easily is bad, or that you have to sweat and work hard to earn, but I don’t think that way. Instead of working three times as hard to earn three times as much, I aim to earn three times as much in one-third the time. Of course, it’s not easy, and I might never fully reach that point. But unless you aim for it, you’ll never get close. You have to use your head, think hard, and aim for it instead of giving up from the start.

Having lived by grit and hard work for so long, I thought, “Wow, that sounds amazing, but it’s impossible in reality” and didn’t take it seriously. But over time, my husband kept saying things like:

Why do you act without thinking? Plan your strategy before you move.

Don’t just swallow everything whole. Question common sense. Just because it’s common sense doesn’t mean it’s right. Think from zero base whether it’s really correct.

And so on… At first, I resisted, saying, “I know, but I’m not that skillful!” But after we married and had children, and I couldn’t move freely, and my stamina declined compared to my youth, I gradually thought, “Indeed, I can’t get by on grit alone anymore. I have to use my brain and build a system to make money.”

Since late January this year, due to the coronavirus, my husband has been working from home for five months. Although the state of emergency has been lifted, he recently said:

We tried remote work company-wide for a few months, and everyone did well, so from now on, our company will mainly operate remotely. I currently go to the office once a week, but I hope to reduce that to about once a month soon.

When I asked, “Really? Will the company run like that?” he said, “Yes, it’s running. We built the system for that.”

I deeply felt that my husband has consistently said this since we met, is seriously aiming for it, and is steadily climbing the ladder.