Toshio Tsubouchi is one of the ten largest chaebols that control Japan. He owns Japan’s largest shipyard and steel plant and owns 180 companies. In Japan, he is known as the “King of Reconstruction” and the “God of Management.” It was such a man who, with his unique business methods, finally brought those 180 companies that were heavily in debt and on the verge of bankruptcy back to life.
In the early years, Toshio Tsubouchi started his business by opening a movie theater in Matsuyama, Japan. By 1955, his cinemas had grown to more than 30. He also became a well-known “Cinema Emperor”. After this successful career experience, he began to plan for the next step of development. He acquired the Kurushima Shipyard, which was out of business and on the verge of bankruptcy. The risk was very high at the time. He first took a series of measures to streamline the staff, and then he conducted ideological training for employees, so that employees had a strong sense of crisis and collective awareness. Such a team is a refined and professional team, and every employee returns to work with full fighting spirit. After that, he began to dabble in the sales model. He found that he could sell the ships to fishermen on installment payment and mobilized all employees to be salesmen. In this way, 8 years later, Kurushima Shipyard was not only resurrected, but also became the fifth largest shipyard in Japan and the 22nd largest shipbuilding industry in the world.
Toshio Tsubouchi’s genius for reconstruction was also on full display when he saved the Oriental Hotel in Kobe, Japan. In 1971, Kobe’s most famous Oriental Hotel fell into a serious business crisis and was on the verge of bankruptcy. With the recommendation, Toshio Tsubouchi bought the Oriental Hotel. After many rounds of education and training for employees, they aroused professionalism and developed a sense of enthusiastic service. Eventually, the business of Oriental Hotel gradually improved. At the same time, he rescued a Toho Mutual Bank from bankruptcy. As an outsider, Toshio Tsubouchi can always turn around from being unfamiliar with it to a successful comeback in the end.
In 1975, four giant steel ships carefully built by Toshio Tsubouchi were officially released from the factory. This witnessed the largest order since the establishment of Kurushima Shipyard. But then there were many incredible twists and turns. In 1973, the first oil crisis broke out, and the Japanese economy, which had been prospering for many years, suffered a heavy blow, and its gross industrial production dropped by 20%. The shipbuilding industry was hit hard first, and Toshio Tsubouchi was not spared either. Not long after, the fourth war broke out in the Middle East. The Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) announced an oil embargo against the West, and international oil prices soared. The shipping company had to go back to Toshio Tsubouchi to cancel the shipping contract, but four ships had been built with a total investment of 30 billion yen. Toshio Tsubouchi did not deal with the problem passively. Instead, he began to actively save himself. While asking banks for help, they laid off employees and cut wages to reduce costs. At this point, Toshio Tsubouchi’s usual accumulated character saved him. Although this Japanese shipping king who started his career in movie theaters has a bad temper, he regards credibility as his life and has won praise from the Japanese financial community.
In order to reduce expenses, Toshio Tsubouchi cut wages by 10% to 15% throughout the factory, stopped dividends and salary increases within three years, abolished the weekend system, and extended the work day by one hour. As soon as this order came out, the workers were filled with resentment. A labor dispute that shocked the country made Toshio Tsubouchi infamous overnight. In that major labor dispute, Kurushima Shipyard lost half of its employees. But the good thing is that this gives Hisao Tsubouchi another chance to streamline the number of people. Since the oil crisis, internally, Toshio Tsubouchi has continued to provide employees with extensive training to help them grow rapidly. Externally, he found that Japanese people engaged in shipping did not dare to build new ships because they were worried that huge investments would be wasted. In order to solve this problem, Toshio Tsubouchi stepped forward again. He helped advance the ship owner’s capital and provided guarantee to the ship owner. In this way, he tied the interests of all parties together and drove the three parties to move forward together. After repaying 28.5 billion yen in three years and leading Kurushima Shipyard to the top of Japan, Toshio Tsubouchi not only fulfilled his original promise, but also repaid all the salary increases owed to employees over the years.
Toshio Tsubouchi’s extraordinary ability has impressed everyone from all walks of life. In 1978, Toshio Tsubouchi did another very important thing, which was the reconstruction of Sasebo Heavy Industries. Due to its complicated background, Sasebo Heavy Industries has a strong bureaucracy and its operations are chaotic. Hisao Tsubouchi not only took over this mess, but also turned it around in a short period of time. In 1983, he paid off all debts. Within four years, Sasebo Heavy Industries was completely discharged from its debts and paid off 17.1 billion yen of accumulated losses in the early period. The national orders reached 114 billion yen. Toshio Tsubouchi created another miracle.
Toshio Tsubouchi’s life was full of brilliance. As of 1992, he had rebuilt a total of 180 companies that were on the verge of bankruptcy and gave them new life. Therefore, he was called the Reconstruction King by the Japanese. There are more than 150 of them, and they were unable to make ends meet when Hisao Tsubouchi first took over. Toshio Tsubouchi built Japan’s largest shipyard, expanded into various industries such as steel, finance, hotels, and tourism, and established a powerful industrial empire. He was evaluated as one of the top ten chaebols controlling Japan.
