I have always thought of him as the leader in all of this so … but I take great pride in him because he was my PhD student so I take a lot of pride in having sort of at an early stage influenced him, and in this whole field of market design and auction design. This of course, by the way, is the third of my students who’ve won Nobel Prizes.

I’m very happy and I’m very proud, because to be in the line which contains so many really great writers and poets gives me power to use my original language, the Hungarian language. I am really very proud and very happy to use this little language.

Yes. I didn't want to be a writer, but I became one. And now I have many readers, in many countries. I think that's a miracle. So I think I have to be humble regarding this ability. I'm proud of it and I enjoy it, and it is strange to say it this way, but I respect it.

I’m the most proud when I get something from cities, or people. At first I was against awards, you know. I would always say, “This is so fake. The people who vote on this stuff, they never listen to the music.” But for me it’s when I received awards or something from the city. Just to go to somebody’s house and eat. Or people come and say, “We spent our anniversary checking you out,” or “We were making love to one of your records, and we had a child!” See that kind of stuff makes me feel good. Like you get a key to the city and the people are really into it. Not just, “Oh, let’s give him the key to the city because he got some publicity.” It will be some people you knew, and you were there at their school, and you worked in the community.

We didn’t research the product. We didn’t launch a focus group or field a study. We had an idea, and we acted. The results informed our thinking.

Of course, my decision faced plenty of criticism. One of my fellow Japanese CEOs went so far as to call the plan “stupid” – notable, in a country where executives do not generally criticize one another in the press. Clearly, I would have to fight an uphill battle for cultural acceptance. But I was not deterred. A seismic shift demands that we adapt to a new landscape, and a seismic economic shift is exactly what Japan has undergone in recent decades, driven by the forces of globalization and digitization. The only way to compete in this interconnected internet age is to speak the language of the market – and that language is English.

I REALIZED IN THOSE DAYS HOW TENUOUS OUR EXISTENCE IS,” HE WROTE IN HBR. “WE HAVE ONLY ONE LIFE, AND IT MUST BE LIVED TO THE FULLEST—NOT SOMEDAY, BUT NOW.

Many times when I found myself at a personal crossroads – when I graduated from Hitotsubashi University and was unsure about whether I wanted to go into research or become a businessman, when I quit my job at the Industrial Bank of Japan (currently Mizuho Bank), when I founded Rakuten, when I tried to buy Tokyo Broadcasting System (TBS) – I always visited my dad in Kobe to ask his advice. Like my wife, my dad was a behind-the-scenes counselor to me.

What I’ve come to realize is this: Optimism is more than just a feeling; it’s a strategic approach. And when navigating uncertainty, setbacks and change, it’s one of the most powerful tools in our arsenal.

The key to success is not perfection. It’s knowing yourself.