Masahiro Wakuda (Dentsu Kyushu Inc.) ⇔ Susumu Namikawa (Dentsu Business Creation Center)

This is an exchange of letters, a back-and-forth correspondence, where I share my thoughts on the future of advertising, as explored in my book released this past March, Communication Shift: From "Selling Things" to Communication that "Improves Society" (Hatori Shoten), with various individuals.
For the first two installments, I wrote letters to my correspondents. This time, we switch roles. I decided to ask someone who read the book to write a letter to me first.

My correspondent this time is Masahiro Wakuda, Creative Director at Dentsu Kyushu Inc., who planned the "Kumamon's Cheek Goes Missing" campaign.

My first encounter with Mr. Wakuda was after the Great East Japan Earthquake. Mr. Imanaga, a Creative Director at Dentsu Kyushu Inc., asked me, "There's this passionate guy thinking about projects for earthquake recovery. Can I send him to consult with you?" That's how we met.
After that, we lost touch for a long time. The second time we met was just recently. I had a chance to go to Fukuoka, and we had a drink together, but we didn't really get to talk properly. That left me feeling a bit regretful, which is why I asked him for this exchange of letters.
But in this correspondence, a new fact came to light! (Maybe I'm exaggerating...) I thought our first meeting was after the earthquake, but it turns out... it wasn't actually our first meeting.

---

To Mr. Namikawa.

It's been a while. This is Wakuda from Fukuoka in the west.
The other day, even though it had been a while since we last met, I ended up inviting you to my home. I'm embarrassed about that.
That light-footed approach, that student-like sense of just hanging out at home drinking, that closeness.
That's the impression I get of you—connecting people to people, companies to companies, communities to communities.
That's the impression I get of you, Namikawa-san, watching from afar.

Tokyo and Fukuoka, and both of us are copywriters at our core.
Since that's the kind of person Mr. Namikawa is, we've never worked together directly, of course.
Both our recent meeting and the one before that in Tokyo were arranged by Creative Director Masao Imanaga. Since Mr. Imanaga said, "If you two are doing a web interview, write about me!", that's why this bit is inserted here (Mr. Imanaga, is this okay?). Actually, my first contact with Mr. Namikawa was over 10 years ago, in 2004. I had just joined Dentsu Kyushu Inc. and was attending new employee training with my peers in Shiodome. Mr. Namikawa came as part of the program.

The main lecturer for that session was copywriter Makoto Tsunoda. I recall Mr. Namikawa coming as a representative of the younger generation. To be perfectly honest, and with all due respect to Mr. Tsunoda, Mr. Namikawa left a stronger impression on me than the main speaker, Mr. Tsunoda. Why did he stand out more than such a great pioneer? It was because I had always assumed that instructors for internal training would speak confidently about their work, brimming with the dreams and hopes that every new employee carries, talking about a promising future.

But when Mr. Namikawa spoke about his work and projects, he seemed somehow lacking in confidence. Unreliable. Rather than proudly boasting about his work, he gave the impression of saying, "Hey, I'm thinking about this... what do you think?" That image stayed with me throughout the entire two-month training program.

Something I vaguely noticed back then. And what I became certain of after reading "Communication Shift." Back then, in 2004. Ten years ago.
Was Mr. Namikawa hesitating? After hesitating and hesitating and hesitating, did he approach us young people, who still didn't understand anything about advertising, with an attitude like, "This might not even be about advertising, but I think I'm right. What do you think?"

I don't know how deep or long that period of uncertainty was. But I realized anew that the shift he reached at the end of that uncertainty is precisely what drives Mr. Namikawa today and what's written in his book. But the reason I'm having this realization now? Probably because I'm feeling lost myself. I get the current trend in the ad industry: that we should do socially responsible things. I even occasionally lecture people, saying things like "Social good is the global trend" in a rather pompous way.

But within my own hesitation, there's another axis. Speaking up for what's right is difficult, and above all, embarrassing. Personally, I want to do what's fun more than what's right. Reading Communication Shift from that point on, I felt like someone was seeing right through that hesitation within me. And then, the conclusion I forcibly reached, self-contained: perhaps my own shift is about drawing a line between what's right and what's fun.

Not a line that divides them, but one that multiplies their energies. Mathematically speaking, the sum of vectors. Perhaps the work I should be doing now is like an arrow that satisfies both rightness and fun, propelling me further.

Volunteering is often perceived as implying a spirit of self-sacrifice. But I doubt anyone who appeared in Communication Shift thought that way. It can't even be framed by a cliché like "self-realization." They're probably people who, through creative methods, send out into the world their own sum of what's right and enjoyable for themselves and for society. For some, like Mr. Namikawa, it's a state reached after wandering and wandering and wandering.

It seems this journey of advertising will be a long one for me too. From this distant western land, I wish Mr. Namikawa continued good travels. Please drop by anytime when you come to Fukuoka. That said, we definitely drank too much the other day.

P.S.:
Come to think of it, I should add that when I asked Mr. Imanaga, "Can I even write something correct?", he replied, "Who cares if it's correct? Just write about me! That's what's correct!" Right, Mr. Imanaga?

 

To Wakuda-kun.

Thanks for the letter.

I remember that lecture very well.
It was a time when I was really struggling. Back then, I tried challenging myself by combining volunteer work with idol activities, or creating a newspaper section with Mr. Imanaga called "Bite In! Keizai-kun" to explain economics in an accessible way. But it never really gained traction, and I couldn't even figure out for myself what it was I was doing. There were no words to neatly categorize it. I didn't even know the term "social design" back then.

I vaguely believed the future of ad agencies lay precisely in areas existing agencies weren't tackling. What if we injected the interesting ideas of ad agencies into these somewhat rigid worlds—NPOs, volunteering, revitalizing local towns? I felt potential in that alone, in the fact that "no one in advertising was doing it yet," and I dug deeper into that gap.

But looking around, my copywriter peers and juniors were creating commercials everyone knew, winning big awards. It made me wonder if what I was doing, what I was trying to do, was just niche, obsessive, the kind of thing nobody would understand. Or maybe, even then, it was fine. If just one in a hundred, or one in a thousand, found it interesting, that was enough. or even if nobody understood it at all, I didn't care. I was feeling pretty down in the dumps back then.

Around that time, I was asked to speak at an in-house training session. Actually, that was the first time I'd ever given what you'd call a proper lecture. (I'm grateful to Mr. Tsunoda for hiring me as a speaker back then, even though I hadn't handled a single campaign anyone knew about.)
So, I was really pumped up, thinking I'd give it my all.

About 20 young employees attended, but I figured maybe one person would relate to what I was doing. Maybe none. But I spoke hoping that even just one person would be there.

After I spoke like that, I received feedback from the employees who attended.

I couldn't believe my eyes. Most of them wrote things like, "It gave me courage," or "I really related to it." I took it all in, stupidly straightforward, and I was so, so happy. It's embarrassing, but I kept those feedback letters, treasuring them, never throwing them away.

But I hadn't realized that Wakuda-kun was among the employees who attended back then.
Then, this time, I remembered those feedback sheets like I'd been struck by lightning. I searched through my drawer and found them.

A message from young Wakuda-kun!

It's been quite a while, but I finally got to properly talk about it personally (though it's also in public).

It makes me happy to think that the Wakuda-kun from back then connects to the Wakuda-kun who created the Kumamon Cheek Project now.

And knowing that I was there for a moment along that path, involved in Wakuda-kun's life, makes me even happier.

Back then, I was really lost myself. But maybe precisely because I was lost, I was able to pass something on to my future self, to future Wakuda-kun.

If current Wakuda-kun has both "right" and "fun" vectors, I think the beauty of having two vectors is that it allows you to "be lost."

It's precisely because we hesitate that we feel that thrill.
It's precisely because we hesitate that we gain access to various vectors, and as a result, the total sum grows larger.

I, too, will continue to hesitate from now on.
Let's both keep hesitating.

Hmm, maybe this back-and-forth correspondence isn't really about advertising after all. But I've always thought it was about advertising.