On 25 July 2021, on a hot summer day, a sparkling gentleman walked in.
He is Takayuki Sugimoto (30 years old, doctor), a 3rd ICPA student, who completed the ICPA International Gentlemen’s Education Elementary Programme on that day. He started this programme a little after his senior and mentor, Mr Satoshi Yamashita (ICPA 3rd year student, first graduate of the ICPA International Gentlemen’s Education Elementary Programme), and although he was a little worried at first, he quickly absorbed it and found its value. A video is attached at the end.
(Original text by Sugimoto, below)
I have completed the beginner’s course, and in 2019, still before the Corona Disaster, I attended a 5-hour socialisation course at the invitation of my senior Dr Yamashita, at which time I met Murata Sensei and thought she was a very powerful person who was also supportive.
There was no doubt that the content was very important for doing business and exchanges in international locations, but I had other commitments at the time and, as I could say at the time, it was difficult to afford the cost of the course on my salary at the time. I did not attend the beginners’ course.
After that, I attended several ICPA events and found the courses useful and, above all, enjoyable to learn, so I was inclined to take them somehow.
Then, in February 2021, I was so impressed at the 3rd Anniversary Japanese and Western Dance Dinner, and after listening to the stories of other participants, I felt that I could not continue as I was, and I made an immediate decision to attend the course on that occasion.
The reason why I decided to stay in my current situation is that I had been feeling very inadequate and had lost the desire to try new things for a relatively long period of time. Therefore, my main motivation for attending the course was to learn how to behave in an upper-class, beautiful way through the course, and to gain confidence that I could do it.
The actual course started, and at first it was easy for me to get to grips with topics such as history, which I was very good at in high school, so I was able to discover the joy of learning again.
Also, the sections on posture and personal image were things that I had never really thought about, and while they taught me these things, they naturally guided me to think and act on my own. I was also not very good at conversation, so I actually wrote sentences in English and they corrected them for me.
I think that through mutual learning, in which we actually output what we have learned, we were able to master the basics, such as attitude and behaviour, even though this was only a beginner level course.
Looking back after half to two-thirds of the course, I started to reflect on my daily life, wondering if this colour would suit me today and how I should behave.
I was surprised myself when I realised this. In fact, I had hardly ever thought about how I should behave, my posture or how I should dress.
I believe that the reason I have changed so much in such a short period of time is due to the passionate energy and guidance of Murata-sensei.
From now on, I would like to deepen the basic gentleman’s attitude that I learnt in the beginner’s class. I would also like to make use of this in my daily life so that those who work under me will be able to spend their time comfortably.
Video interview.
English subtitles will be added.
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