Yume Pro Workshop at OKI: Creating Businesses from Personal Purpose and Global Challenges [Sep 10]

Since its establishment in 2016, SHIP has been providing workshops on designing businesses to address social challenges, including workshops that apply the Purpose Engineering methodology in recent years.

On September 10, SHIP conducted a workshop at Oki Electric Industry Co., Ltd. (OKI) using the Purpose Engineering approach to explore the company’s vision two years ahead and the business models needed to achieve it.

Following the adoption of the SDGs, OKI was one of the first companies in Japan to launch employee-driven innovation initiatives aimed at achieving the SDGs and addressing social challenges. As part of this innovation program, known as Yume Pro, OKI holds the Yume Hub Meetings, a nine-month initiative in which around 30 employees—including group employees from Japan and overseas—collaborate each year to create ideas for operational reform and new businesses.

The workshop delivered by SHIP was conducted as one session within the Yume Hub Meetings. After gaining an understanding of the relationship between the SDGs and innovation through a lecture, participants defined their personal aspirations and areas of expertise as “infra (small) purpose,” the achievement of the SDGs as the “meta purpose,” and then set driving objectives for the next two years (the “mid-purpose”) to explore potential business model ideas.

From a lecture on the relationship between the SDGs and innovation

Purpose Engineering framework: infra (small) purpose,  meta purpose, mid-purpose (driving objectives), and their relationship to the SDGs

The workshop lasted just three and a half hours, yet participants based in Japan and abroad, both in person and online, actively engaged in group discussions and identified driving goals for the next two years while generating ideas for operational innovation and new business concepts.

Workshop was held in the innovation room “Yume ST”