Wait—my next job wasn’t about “building systems.” It was about “designing the company itself”!

What Comes After Building a Financial System?

Bringing a London-Based System to Japan

At the time, I was part of a project to introduce a financial system developed by a company in London into Japan.

My role was application management.

I was responsible for supporting the implementation in Japan while working closely with the system team in London and coordinating the applications across the overall system.

The London-based system team took the lead in developing and managing the applications themselves.

My role was to handle the coordination and confirmation needed on the Japanese side, and I stayed with the project all the way through the final stages of testing.

Finally, we could see the launch approaching.

I supported the operations team by reviewing their business processes and making sure they would be able to use the system effectively once it went live.

I remember thinking,

“This project will be finished soon.”

It was March.

I was starting to think about what would come next.

▼開発会社選びに悩んでいる方はこちら

 

“There’s a New Project for You.”

That was when someone approached me.

“You’ve got a new project.”

Naturally, I thought:

“Another system development project?”

But when I heard the details, it was something completely different.

“You’re going to be assigned to a client company.”

…Wait.

What does that mean?

Isn’t this supposed to be another system development project?

Then I heard the next part.

“You’ll be joining their IT planning department.”

That surprised me.

Until then, I had worked on application design and system implementation.

I had also gained experience creating project plans.

But planning the future of an entire company’s IT environment?

That was completely new to me.

This Is Interesting!

But the more I thought about it, the more interesting it became.

Until then, I had been thinking about how to build an individual system.

This time, it was different.

How should the company manage its systems as a whole?

What systems would the company need?

What should be kept, and what should be changed?

When should the company invest in new technologies?

I would be planning all of this at the enterprise level.

I thought to myself:

“I’ve done quite a bit of project planning already.”

To be honest, I still wasn’t very confident when it came to infrastructure.

But I had experience creating overall project plans, organizing stakeholders, and moving system implementation forward.

Now, I would be applying those skills to the IT strategy of an entire company.

“That’s actually pretty exciting.”

The very idea that such a job existed was new and fascinating to me.

And Only One Person Was Chosen

There was another surprise.

Only one person from the company would be selected.

And I was that person.

I would have the opportunity to work with a company that played a role in Japan’s financial infrastructure—not as someone building systems, but as someone planning how IT should support the business.

I was genuinely excited.

At the same time, I was nervous.

“How far will my previous experience take me?”

“What if I’m completely out of my depth?”

The financial industry was full of incredibly smart people.

Many of them had studied advanced mathematics and financial theory and had built careers as highly specialized professionals.

What could I contribute in an environment like that?

From “Building” to “Thinking”

Looking back, this was a major turning point in my career.

IT is not only about building systems.

Before building anything, there are bigger questions:

“What should we build in the first place?”

“Where should the company invest in IT?”

“How can we combine systems and technologies to make the entire organization stronger?”

Having experience in system development allowed me to understand what actually happens on the ground.

And having experience managing projects taught me how to turn plans into reality.

Now, I was going to expand those experiences from the project level to the enterprise level.

That was my first real experience in IT planning.

I had built systems.

And what was waiting for me after that was not another system.

It was the challenge of thinking about how to design the future of an entire company.

And that was where a new chapter of my career began.

I can do this! Take the first step tomorrow.