A young engineer, a proud proposal, and one question from his manager that he never forgot.
Some moments change you quietly. Just a simple question that stays with you for life.
This is one of those moments for me.
It happened early on, when I was still new at Honda. Like most young engineers, I wanted to prove myself. So for days, I dug into the numbers. I looked at performance, weight, cost, everything I could think of. I worked hard on it, and by the end, I felt genuinely proud of what I had put together.
I laid out my proposal before my manager, buoyed by a strong sense of confidence
He went through it slowly, page by page, not saying much. Then he looked up and asked me just one question.
"What is the A00?"
I said, "Performance improvement, weight reduction, cost optimisation."
He smiled.
"No," he said. "That's not A00."
I didn't understand. Those were literally the goals of my project. What else could he possibly mean?
He leaned forward and asked again, this time slower.
"Better performance... for what?"
"Lower cost... for what?"
"Lighter weight... for what?"
And then he explained something I've carried with me ever since.
"A00 is the reason behind everything. It comes before the objective, before the target, before any number on a page. Before we jump to solutions, we need to know why this work matters at all."
That conversation lasted a few minutes. But it changed how I think, for good.
Before that day, I believed a good project started with a smart idea. Honda taught me it actually starts with a real reason to exist.
Most companies ask, "What should we do?" The good ones ask, "Why should we do it?"
It sounds like a small shift. It's not. It changes everything that follows.
As the years went by, I started noticing this everywhere. People say profit is the goal. It isn't. Profit is just what happens when you create something people actually value. Technology isn't the goal either, it's a tool. Even market share isn't the goal. It is the result of solving meaningful customer problems.
This one lesson shaped how I led people for the next thirty years. Whenever someone came to me with an idea, I didn't start with budgets or deadlines. I asked one thing first.
"What problem are we really trying to solve?"
That one question changed almost every conversation. Sometimes we realised we were chasing the wrong problem. Sometimes we found something much bigger hiding behind the original idea. And sometimes, once we were honest about the "why," we just dropped the project altogether.
None of that felt like failure. It felt like finally seeing clearly.
Purpose gives you clarity. Clarity brings people together. And when people are aligned, things actually get done.
These days, working with entrepreneurs and small manufacturers, I see the same pattern again and again. People put in huge effort improving processes, adding new technology, chasing efficiency. But very few stop to ask the question that matters most.
Why are we even doing this?
Technology changes. Markets shift. Business models come and go. Purpose is the one thing that doesn't get old.
The people who keep asking "why" will always stay a step ahead of those who only ask "how."
Looking back, I think Honda gave me something bigger than technical knowledge. It taught me how to think. And honestly, that's been the biggest gift of my whole career.
"If this project succeeds brilliantly, what larger purpose will it fulfil?"
Before you say yes to your next project, sit with that question for a minute. Your answer will tell you if you're just improving what already exists, or actually building something new.
Three decades of manufacturing leadership across Honda, Fiat, and Whirlpool doesn't sit in articles alone. If you're working through a difficult decision — a transformation, a turnaround, a new mandate — let's have a direct conversation.