How a Japanese woman became country manager for a major US startup

Country manager of Noom Japan, Yuri Hamasaki.

“I remember riding to visit my father in the hospital. I would sit on the train. There were so many stations between. I would just try to repeat all of the names and wait to see my father.”

The two-hour ride became a ritual of Yuri Hamasaki’s childhood. “All I could do was pray and hope that everything was going to be okay.”

Her mother, studying to become a nurse to help the family, became a role model. Books on Florence Nightingale, considered the founder of modern nursing, became a passion. Yuri has connected the dots, overcome the extreme adversity female leaders face in Japan, and now wants to help others as the country manager for diet and healthcare app Noom.

Balance

The term salaryman in Japan evokes images of predominantly male workers putting in ridiculous hours, going for drinks after work, and passing out on the way home from exhaustion.

Photo credit: Wikimedia.

Yuri jumped right into that world.

“I had a sales title but I was doing so many different things,” Yuri reflects on her first job. “I was working with engineers until 6:00 am trying to get a release out. Then I would take a shower and go back to work at 9:00 am.”

Yuri was struggling to find balance. She ended up gaining 13 kilograms out of college. After a few years she jumped ship and joined the gaming company Gree.

Structure

“I joined right before it really took off. There were around 400 people at the time.”

People’s attitudes changed. It was getting really dark.

Yuri discovered the importance of management and data. “We were using numbers and money to really break down decisions logically when deciding how to grow the company.” There was a strong focus on product but the company was experiencing extreme growing pains. “The growth of knowledge was not keeping up with the people.”

After a year and a half, sales started to go down.

Hustle

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