Don’t worry about what you can’t control. Take action on what you can

 Are We Really Facing a Labor Shortage?

Last week, I attended a board meeting for a certain industry association.
There were about 26 board members present, many of whom are from small and mid-sized companies.

A common theme in our discussion was the labor shortage. Many people shared how difficult it is to hire new employees, saying things like, “It’s a serious problem. We just can’t find people.”

But I started to wonder—
Is this really because of Japan’s declining population? Is that truly why small companies can’t hire people?

Let me share our situation at Hattori Group.
Each year, we hire about 5 to 10 new graduates. Including mid-career hires, global staff, part-timers, and temporary workers, the total number of hires is about 20 to 30 per year.
Of course, some employees also leave, so our total staff size isn’t growing by dozens each year. It’s a gradual increase.

Now let’s focus only on new graduates.
In Japan, even in 2025, there are still around one million new graduates entering the workforce.

For large corporations hiring thousands of people each year, a population drop from one million to 900,000 may be a big issue.
But for small and mid scale companies like ours, that only need 5 or 6 new hires—
Does a 10% drop in population really make it impossible to hire?

The answer is: probably not.
Yes, there is some impact, but the bigger problem may lie elsewhere—
in how companies approach recruitment, how they present themselves, and how much effort they put into making their company attractive.

Blaming society’s bigger issues may make things emotionally easier for us as leaders, but that mindset won’t improve the situation.
In fact, small companies are less affected by demographic changes because we need fewer hires.
This is why major companies have to raise starting salaries to 300,000 yen to secure enough talent.

We cannot solve Japan’s aging society or declining birthrate alone.
But we can change our recruitment strategy.
In business, there are always problems—but if we don’t define the right problem, no solution will work, no matter how hard we try.

Even a problem that seems out of our control—like the declining birthrate—can be broken down and reframed into something we can control, like improving our recruitment approach.

In a time of rapid change, identifying the right problem may be even more important than solving problems themselves.

This is exactly why, in the Hattori Way, we emphasize:
“Don’t worry about what you can’t control. Take action on what you can.”