Handover | Fumitoshi Kato, Dean of the Graduate School of Media and Governance
October 19, 2021
A new structure began on October 1. It is a time of personnel changes. The state of emergency was finally lifted, just as the fall semester classes were about to begin. There are people leaving, new people joining, and people staying on. As for myself, I will be writing the "Okashira's Diary" for a while longer. (I look forward to working with you for another two years.)
As was written inMatsukawa-san's recent article, there are many committees on campus, and the members of each of these committees have also been renewed. Opportunities to meet in person have also been increasing. Looking back, much of our time and energy over the past two years has been consumed by responding to COVID-19. While we cannot let our guard down yet, I can feel that the situation is gradually improving.
Attending several committee meetings and meeting new members has made me think again about handovers. Ideally, each committee should be structured with a smooth rotation of members. We should avoid concentrating the burden on specific individuals, and it is better to share the history and background of various issues as much as possible. Some people are concerned that power becomes concentrated in the hands of long-serving members. Depending on the nature of the work, you can manage by learning as you go, even if you are inexperienced. We want to assign roles as fairly as possible to avoid any imbalance.
Sometimes, a changeover happens just when you have finally gotten used to the job after working for a while. It is not uncommon for personnel changes to be decided in ways beyond one's control. This is where the topic of handovers comes in. Two years ago, when I took on the role of "Okashira," there were various handovers. While I was surprised by how much I did not know, I was also grateful for what I had been spared from knowing. This was because someone had been carefully handling things behind the scenes.
Handovers require various records, including minutes of meetings. Since minutes are inherently concise summaries of complex exchanges, detailed expressions and contextual information are naturally omitted. Sensitive content may sometimes not be recorded. The situation on the ground is recorded in numerous fragments, so in such cases, I try to understand the situation by seeking guidance from veteran colleagues and administrative staff, who are like "living dictionaries." Relying on what is recorded, one imagines what was not. To grasp the situation from as many angles as possible, I sometimes ask my predecessor. In this way, I gradually sketch out the contours. It feels like solving a quiz.
In fact, this "Okashira's Diary" also serves as a record of SFC, accumulated over more than 15 years. It records what the "Okashira" have seen and thought, with some nostalgic content reflecting the times, while also revealing themes that remain unchanged over the years. Each article in the archive is like a piece of a jigsaw puzzle. And it is our job to look at these pieces and fit them together. What makes this jigsaw puzzle particularly interesting is that there is no single, predetermined "finished picture" provided. Within the circumstances of the time, we connect the pieces with our own sensibilities to depict SFC's "past" and "future."
For example, the Miraisozojuku (Institute for Designing the Future) project, now more than 10 years since its conception, has been a frequent topic in this "Okashira's Diary." Successive "Okashira," starting around the time of "Celebrating SFC's 20th Anniversary (2010)," envisioned a residential learning program, started the "Soshi-Soai Camp for Designing the Future (2011)," and spoke of "Making Dreams a Reality (2011)." After that, opportunities such as symposiums were created, and with articles like "SFC Moves Forward with Miraisozojuku (2013)," "Miraisozojuku and the SFC 5th Graduating Class Reunion (2015)," and "A Culture of Rebuilding (2015)," the desire for its realization never faded.
By tracing back through the "Okashira's Diary" archive in this way, one can sense the momentum of each era. The project has been passed down through several changes in leadership. Although some plans were "overwritten" due to various circumstances, there is a spirit that has been continuously flowing. Last fall, all the residential buildings of theBeta Villageon the east side were completed. Furthermore, this summer, construction began on the student dormitories of the Eta Village on the west side. I wrote "A University with Life (2021)" while reflecting on the day I showed the President and the Vice-Presidents around.
Through daily records, our communication comes to life. And communication, in turn, is accumulated as records. Records do not exist solely to restore the past as it was. They are for preparing to face change while paying respect to the past. We connect multiple pasts to draw a vision of our future. That is what it means to carry on a legacy.
On October 15, President Ito's "Notes from the President's Office" was launched. I heard that this project was inspired by SFC's "Okashira's Diary." Let's add the episodes written in the "Notes from the President's Office" as precious pieces to our puzzle.