Why We Founded wesionaryTEAM: Taking On the Challenge of Co-Creation

Today, wesionaryTEAM works on product development for a wide range of companies from our offices in Japan and Nepal, under the vision of "a society where co-creation is the norm."

The road here, however, was anything but smooth. Let me tell you the story of how I, Ichiro Nagata, an introvert who had never even considered doing anything outside my company, came to found a company like this.

Recognizing the Problem

I worked as a systems engineer for 15 years. At a contract development company, a social game startup and an operating company, I built broad experience across the front end, back end and infrastructure.

Back then, I had no particular ambitions beyond my work and improving my development skills. I was introverted and kept my interactions with people to a minimum. I went to after-work drinks with colleagues only when necessary, and I never thought about doing anything outside the company.

The turning point came around 2018. The company I worked for adopted "open innovation" as a policy and began encouraging engagement with the outside world. Side jobs were also permitted. The idea was that contact with the outside would bring new experiences, insights and stimulation, which would help the company innovate over the medium to long term.

The company's new policy felt fresh, and it gave me a push. I started attending startup events, using coworking spaces and using business matching apps.

There I met many startup CEOs and founding members. They told me about their passion for their businesses, the problems they wanted to solve and why those mattered, and the trouble they were having with development. Along the way, I ended up helping with product development at startups whose missions resonated with me.

Having already worked at startups for about six years, I was used to things like starting small, agile development, putting users first, MVPs and fact-based decision-making. As a side job, it was very stimulating and enjoyable, and over a few years I was able to work on product development for four startups.

The Dilemma Startups Face

As I got involved with several startups, however, I came to feel one problem strongly.

Even when founders and founding members had strong convictions, the quality and speed of development were often holding them back.

At a startup, everyone needs to think about the business, engage with users, and keep track of and understand the company's current situation, its funding and its next stage. A strong sense of ownership is required. That means development inevitably has to be something close to in-house. For these reasons, the conventional model of throwing development over to a contract development company doesn't fit.

So should startups simply hire full-time engineers? The reality was that this was difficult.

Engineers don't come to startups. Even finding them is hard. Startups often struggle to cover recruiting costs and pay market-rate salaries. It's a different story for founders who have had several exits, or who have raised plenty of money and have name recognition, but otherwise securing talent is extremely difficult.

As a result, startups inevitably end up forming teams by gathering freelancers and people working on the side.

But teams formed this way had their own problems. Development progress was often unstable, and it was hard to raise either the sense of ownership or teamwork. Each member had a main job and their own priorities and circumstances.

• Hiring full-time engineers is difficult

• Freelance and side-job teams make unstable progress and have a weak sense of ownership

• Contract vendors don't fit in either cost or mindset

Caught in this dilemma, I saw the state of development teams firsthand as a core member working close to the founders, and the feeling that "this is a major barrier to the business" never left the back of my mind.

Meeting Nepal

Around that time, something happened.

Through an acquaintance, I met a Nepali engineer who had been working at a large Japanese company.

This encounter got me thinking about building a team in Nepal. As things stood, hiring engineers was difficult for most startups, and there was little prospect of the situation improving. Freelancers and side-job members had the problems described above. If so, building a team in Nepal might be one way through.

At the same time, though, I had heard many negative opinions about offshore development: "the quality is poor," "communication is difficult," "we'd rather not use it if we can avoid it." Although I had no firsthand experience, I myself had a strongly negative view of offshore development.

On top of that, my English at the time consisted only of studying for the TOEIC, and I could barely speak it. I had never imagined doing anything abroad.

Even so, I couldn't stay still.

Here were startups with a strong desire to advance society and improve something, yet product development wasn't progressing as they hoped, leading to lost trust and lost time. I felt deeply uneasy about simply facing this problem without taking any major action.

I decided to take on a big challenge. Even if it was overseas and physically far away, I resolved to build a team and culture close to an in-house one, capable of a startup mindset.

Resolve and Action

With advice and support from the Nepali engineer at the large company, I actually flew to Nepal.

I had a TOEIC score of 900, but I wasn't used to English conversation and couldn't shake my embarrassment about speaking it. So I communicated through an interpreter.

And for the first time, I interviewed people myself, hired them and built a team.

I couldn't contain my excitement. I was sincerely grateful to the members who shared what I wanted to do and joined the team. They were calm, energetic and had a strong desire to contribute. Their attitude gave me the courage to push this initiative forward.

A team of three was born.

Growth and the Founding of wesionaryTEAM

We were feeling our way forward. But by refining our methods and tech stack, product development progressed. Before I knew it, the team had grown to more than ten people.

What made me especially happy was the change in the members' mindset.

In Japan and abroad alike, most engineers prioritize improving their technical skills and programming, and are not used to taking part in business development, putting users first, or pursuing numbers and taking responsibility for them. They can understand the importance and agree with it. But because of their priorities and long-held habits of thought, it takes time for their actions to follow.

Even so, some members gradually began to change how they spoke and acted. When I saw them proactively speaking up and acting on the business, I was truly happy.

As the team grew, I sensed room to scale further. So I decided to formally establish a company: so that both the startups and the members could focus on product development with greater peace of mind, so that responsibility would be clear, and so that we would have an environment where even more talented members could join the team.

That is how wesionaryTEAM was founded. We set up our headquarters in Japan and a branch in Nepal.

"A Society Where Co-Creation Is the Norm"

We made "a society where co-creation is the norm" the company's vision.

The name wesionaryTEAM comes from "The Visionary Team." It expresses our wish to be a team that shares the vision of a business and works together to realize it.

Even when we are physically far apart, as Japan and Nepal are, even when we speak different languages, and even under a client-vendor contract, I want to overcome these barriers and build a team close to an "in-house" one.

I want everyone involved in product development to have a sense of ownership and to be able to apply their expertise to the growth of the business.

It is from these convictions that we put "co-creation" into our vision.

The Challenge of Making Co-Creation Systematic

"Co-creation," "ownership," "user first": these are easy to say. But they are extremely hard to embody.

Even at large companies, you hear that employee engagement is low and that the sense of ownership doesn't grow. When it comes to people outside the company, this becomes even harder.

Even when members understand these ideas, they don't naturally know how to embody them. Organizational systems are needed.

We are working on initiatives such as the following:

• Creating places and opportunities for members to take part and speak up

• Increasing psychological safety

• Aligning the organization's values and vision with evaluation

To be honest, we are still only halfway there. I can't say with confidence that we have achieved "co-creation."

But by pursuing these initiatives and making "co-creation" systematic, I can feel the organization changing.

Hopes for the Future

We want to make "co-creation" systematic.

Even as the team grows and members change, and whether the client is a startup, a new business at a large company, or a mid-sized company pursuing DX, we want to embody co-creation in a reproducible way and build valuable products.

We also want to share the "co-creation" mindset with the clients we build products with, and work together toward realizing the product's vision with a shared understanding and attitude.

If these convictions resonate with you, let's build a product together.

wesionaryTEAM is a team that shares your vision and works with you to make it a reality.

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wesionaryTEAM Co. Ltd.
Ichiro Nagata, Representative Director