Bridging Gaps with Inclusive Innovation: Tom Stafford's Journey at LIXIL

What is your background and current role now at LIXIL? 

My background is in IT operational support. I've worked in various roles, different industries, and in different countries. I was looking for a new opportunity that I could use my experiences, and I was looking for a globally focused role. I found that LIXIL had an opportunity available, and that LIXIL's corporate values really aligned with my own, so it was a good fit for me. I came here not quite a year ago.

My main role right now is to lead a new team called Global Services. We are focused on creating comprehensive IT services for all of LIXIL worldwide. Our goal is to integrate different processes into a globally standardized set of solutions that simplify and focus the services that are available to all users that need IT assistance. I act as a facilitator between different teams of different disciplines to bridge these gaps and bring people together to collaborate and bring forth new tools to everybody in LIXIL. 

What does a typical day for you look like at LIXIL?

I primarily work remotely from home. I'll start my day online and check messages from the other regions that have different time zones. Then, I'll have a lot of one-on-one conferences with colleagues here in Japan followed by collaborative sessions. The first half of my day is usually in Japanese, and the latter half is in English, allowing me to bridge between different regions. My typical day is very flexible, based on the day's meeting schedule. I'm fortunate that I can have lunch with my wife, or be at home when my kids get back from school. That really helps me maintain that work-life balance. 

What would you say your mission is?

I would say my mission is to make life easier for LIXIL employees. This is based on an experience I had when I first joined the company. I personally found it difficult to find answers I needed when I was getting started, such as where to go to ask certain questions.

What we're trying to do is simplify that process for everybody, ensuring that "there's just one place that you can go to ask this question." That's our ultimate goal.

Can you share some innovations you’ve been working on? 

I've gotten involved in the latest innovative technology - generative AI. We're looking at how we can utilize generative AI to make work more efficient, more effective. This is really groundbreaking, but there's still a lot of confusion and lack of clarity about how this technology can be used. It is very exciting to be able to shape how this tool will be used to enhance people's work and bring value to the company.

What are some of the developments around generative AI you can share?

We have LIXIL’s AI portal and we have the LIXIL AI assistant. What we're aiming to do with the LIXIL AI assistant is to make everyone's work more efficient. The goal is never to replace a role, but to supplement them, just as how a junior employee would assist a senior one. If you can offload some of your daily tasks to the assistant, whatever is part of your daily work, that can make you more effective because you have now time to focus on higher value activities – things that require a deeper level of understanding of the process that you're working on. 

Now that you’ve worked here for over a year, how do you feel about working at LIXIL?

One of the reasons why I was very excited to join is because LIXIL’s vision is to create a home for everyone. Whether that be internally in the company where everybody's opinions are valued and appreciated, or externally where LIXIL is very socially responsible. That makes me feel good about the work that I do, and that I can contribute to that effort.

As someone who's worked in different cultures and different regions, I appreciate how LIXIL is trying to bridge the gap and keep open communication and collaboration so that everybody can come together and have that shared goal to achieve our outcomes. It resonates with me that we are an inclusive organization and that everybody's opinions matter.

I've noticed multiple instances where I see the leadership doing things in what I would consider to be in a non-traditional way, but in an effective manner that shows that communication is open, that doors are open, and that everybody should feel comfortable to share their ideas no matter what their role or their position in the company is. Seeing that has also made me feel comfortable here.

How do you feel about LIXIL's approach to inclusion and collaboration?

In LIXIL, inclusion is not something that I need to actively manage. It's something that naturally happens through the way that the organization is transforming itself.

I have a team with people in different geographic locations, skill sets, and backgrounds. This approach allows us to collaborate and share different ideas, and often come up with new ways of doing things that maybe others might not have considered before.

One of the things that LIXIL embodies is transparency. When you have transparency, it builds trust, which is important to build strong relationships. This is important to me because I can feel like I trust those around me, and collaborate together.

What are your current challenges and achievements so far? 

I'm learning new things every day. One thing I'm really happy about is the fact that, even though I'm challenging myself every day and I often find myself in situations where I may not be comfortable in what needs to be done, there's always a support structure in place to help me. That encourages me to take on and continue embracing new challenges.

What I'm most proud of is getting people to think beyond what they've been doing up till now. Coming in with an outside perspective, I've been able to challenge the norm and explain how a different way of doing things can generate more value than what we may have been currently achieving. Seeing people grasp that idea, understand it, and start asking questions makes me feel good about being able to bring in that new idea.

(As of November 2024)