Past Events

IIM Nagpur was delighted to host Prof. Saral Mukherjee, a highly regarded faculty in the Operations and Quantitative Methods areas at the Indian Institute of Management, Ahmedabad, as part of the IJRC Speaker Series organized by the Indo-Japan Research Centre.

Prof. Mukherjee took the students through Jiro Ono’s journey of intricate craftsmanship, focussed dedication, and fierce passion through the discussion on the documentary “Jiro Dreams of Sushi.”

Jiro is a 94-year-old Japanese chef who owns Sukiyabashi Jiro, a three Michelin star restaurant in Tokyo, Japan. He is regarded as the greatest living sushi craftsman. His restaurant has only ten seats with a fixed menu. To eat at his restaurant, one has to make an appointment a month in advance.

Students had a very immersive discussion with Prof. Mukherjee, where they deliberated on what makes Jiro a “shokunin.” Prof. Mukherjee also discussed the trade-offs to perfection. The pursuit of perfection requires a lot of sacrifices; one has to say no to many options, like in the case of Jiro Ono, he said no to business expansion, diversification, and work-life balance. The cost of a perfect or a nearly perfect good can have an exorbitant cost of appraisal and prevention. The operational excellence achieved by Jiro is a phenomenon worth noting.

IIM Nagpur extends its warm gratitude to Prof. Saral Mukherjee for the insightful session.