Episode #44: Christian Wolf, Managing Director, JAS Forwarding Japan

Christian Wolf, Managing Director of JAS Forwarding Japan originally moved to Japan straight out of university in Germany where he worked in the freight and logistics industry as a student. He first started out as a roads development manager at DHL, developing new business for air and ocean freight transportation from Germany to Japan. Upon moving to Japan from a small village in Germany, Mr. Wolf experienced culture shock, and quickly realized he needed to be “very persistent” and have high “frustration tolerance” to be successful.

Mr. Wolf then moved on to work in the project forwarding business at Panalpina where he dealt with large scale projects with complex challenges such as construction schedules, liabilities involving different transportation modes, and worked alongside engineer specialists. In 2011 Mr. Wolf joined JAS to set up a new project forwarding unit from scratch. He recalls the earlier months as a challenging time since he was pressured to gain profit quite quickly while motivating his team to keep pushing with a positive attitude.

On leading in Japan, Mr. Wolf indicates how difficult it was for him to initially gain the trust from his customers and employees and maintain a positive attitude within his team members. He claims: “You need to gain trust from the customer and it is not seldom that you are quoting for over one year without seeing them... It's a very common process. And there, even if you have a lot of setbacks, you need to be calm and need to demonstrate that we are going to get there.” When faced with challenges such as consecutive profit-losing months, Mr. Wolf says it is important to cut down on your expectations and generate rewarding situations. He also points to open and honest communication with every member of the team as a vital aspect of building trust. Gradually, the new unit grew by building on client relationships and providing expertise on complex transportation solutions. In 2014 he stepped into his current role as Managing Director, leading the 40+ year old business with around 100 employees.

In order to gain trust from an even larger number of employees, Mr. Wolf first tried to understand the history and culture of the company, instead of making drastic changes. Over the years of working in Japan, Mr. Wolf has come to realize that Japanese people value consistency and patience, which he tries to exhibit through his behaviour. During Mr. Wolf’s first year as the Managing Director, he kept all the main department managers in place in order to observe how business had been developed from the previous years. During these early leadership years, Mr. Wolf also spent one-on-one time with his managers to better understand the business from their point of view. In doing so, he also encouraged his employees to be more innovative and think outside of the box when coming up with solutions. Yet Mr. Wolf mentions the importance of respecting the hierarchy and to “follow certain rules to approach certain scenes.” For example, doing nemawashi (groundwork) before a meeting or communicating with an employee through their manager instead of them directly.

To newcomers of Japan, Mr. Wolf advises to not tell one’s colleagues how long one’s assignment is. This is to avoid people from thinking you will only be there for 2-3 years and therefore, is not worth trusting. Mr. Wolf’s second advice is to learn the Japanese language. Lastly, Mr. Wolf advises to “never give up.” He adds: “You need to have a lot of frustration tolerance. Sometimes don't ask the why just accept it.”