At the 8th Sumitomo Riko SDGs Student Essay Award, Economics 4th year student Mikio Watanabe was chosen for the runner-up prize. The essay contest has been held every year since 2014 and has seen entries from over 650 students both from within Japan and abroad.
This year, with increased importance placed on SDGs, decarbonization, and biodiversity preservation, the essay theme was “Changing business starting with a ‘Purpose’ ~Why do we need a reason to exist~”.

Watanabe used what he learned about SDGs in lectures and classes to take part in water and energy saving and rubbish recycling activities, and he used that experience as well as an artistic way of thinking to redefine “purpose” and put it into practice with internal branding.
An artistic way of thinking is unique in that it asks questions starting from the self and promotes creativity and sensitivity, and Watanabe posited that by using this way of thinking to redefine “purpose”, we can create a unique and moving sense of “purpose”. He then went on to describe how to implement this “purpose” using internal branding in a 3-step process: 1) visualization 2) individualization 3) actualization. In particular, he claimed that “talking face to face” makes the 2nd step of individualization much more effective.

Runner-up Watanabe said, “There were times when things didn’t go as planned because of the coronavirus, but I’m glad that what I learned during my time as a student lead to this. Even if each person can only do something small, if one person’s way of thinking changes, I think it can absolutely give birth to great changes in society. From here on out, I’ll keep working towards achieving my own goals.”