Why this seat is different in Japan
The Japan entity is the legal employer, so the Japan Managing Director has formal authority over this person whatever the org chart says. If the solid line goes to a regional BU head in Singapore or India, say in the JD who writes the evaluation, who approves headcount, and who settles a disagreement. Japanese candidates have usually lived through a badly drawn matrix and will probe this.
"P&L responsibility" needs a definition. Many Japanese BU leaders have run a market P&L (revenue and marketing spend) without owning cost of goods, headcount or contribution margin. In one medtech search, every candidate the client had already seen fell short on exactly this point. Say which P&L you mean.
In regulated and technical industries, the channel is the job. Most sales in medical devices, industrial equipment and scientific instruments run through distributors (代理店, 特約店), and key-opinion-leader relationships (KOL) at university hospitals and academic societies (学会) decide adoption. A BU head who cannot manage distributors and KOLs in Japanese will not move the numbers.
Purpose of the role
Own the strategy, numbers and organisation for the business line in Japan. Deliver profitable growth, launch new products successfully in the Japanese market, and build a commercial team that can run without the regional office.
Key responsibilities
Business management
- Build and deliver the annual operating plan, budget and forecast for the business line in Japan.
- Own the agreed P&L: revenue, contribution margin and headcount at minimum.
- Direct sales and marketing as one commercial engine, with clear segmentation and pricing discipline.
Product and market development
- Lead Japan launch planning for new products with global and regional teams, including regulatory timing, reimbursement where relevant, and distributor readiness.
- Build and maintain KOL and customer relationships that give the business early insight and credibility.
- Feed Japan requirements into global product development.
Channel and partners
- Manage distributor and partner agreements, performance and conflict, with the authority to change the channel model where the numbers justify it.
Organisation
- Hire, develop and retain the commercial team. Build a successor for the seat.
- Run performance management inside Japanese labour-law constraints, with HR as a partner.
Compliance
- Uphold industry codes (for medical devices, pharma and finance, the relevant transparency and promotion rules) and group policy.
Candidate profile
Must have
- Eight or more years in the industry with both sales and marketing leadership, not only one of the two.
- Demonstrable P&L ownership of the type you define, in a foreign-capital company in Japan.
- Experience managing a team of ten or more, including hiring and exiting people.
- Distributor and KOL management where the industry requires it.
Preferred
- A product launch in Japan from pre-approval to commercial success.
- Experience reporting into a regional leader outside Japan.
- Exposure to M&A, carve-out or integration if the business is mid-change.
Language
- Japanese at native level for customers, distributors and the team.
- English at business level: regional business reviews, written reporting and launch planning run in English.
Decide before you post
- Solid line and dotted line, and who holds evaluation, headcount and budget authority.
- The P&L definition, in one sentence.
- Whether the role sits on the Japan management committee.
- Team size and whether the first task is to build, fix or maintain.
- Whether the business line faces a carve-out, integration or reorganisation. Candidates find out anyway; better they hear it from you.
How hard is this hire
Moderate to hard. The pool of bilingual leaders who have run sales and marketing together and owned a real P&L in your industry is small, and the strongest are usually being promoted internally. Expect three to five months. The common failure is a marketing leader with no team-management record or a sales leader with no P&L record, promoted into a seat that needs both.
Interview questions that separate candidates
- Define the P&L you owned. What sat above the line you controlled and what sat below it?
- Tell me about a distributor you had to replace or restructure. How did you do it and what did it cost?
- Describe a Japan launch. What did you change from the global plan, and why?
- How did you handle a situation where your regional leader and the Japan MD wanted different things?
- Who on your current team is ready for your job?
