<figure id="attachment_465773" class="wp-caption alignnone" style="width: 5121px;" aria-describedby="caption-attachment-465773"><a href="#" data-ident_hash="46ade529"><img src="https://res.cloudinary.com/fridaydigital/image/private/t_article_image/wpmedia/2026/04/38648d26adedf04a865274c6bfa4a917.jpg" alt=""></a><figcaption id="caption-attachment-465773" class="wp-caption-text">A 32-year-old man who once aspired to become a professional baseball player has achieved success through side businesses and a happy family life by fully utilizing AI. What is his secret? (Photo is for illustrative purposes)</figcaption></figure>
Promoting the idea of an “AI-era career strategy,” “Yoshigi” has been sharing concrete examples of AI usage that dramatically speed up work on X and Threads. His practical, highly reproducible content from a non-engineer perspective has gained support, rapidly increasing his social media following. He works at a major consulting firm and is also an entrepreneur involved in AI implementation and career development support services. His annual income exceeds 20 million yen at the age of 32.
“I can handle my current workload and still secure time with my family, all thanks to AI.”
We spoke with Yoshigi, a parallel worker, about the benefits he gained through AI and his life plans.
<h3>Side-by-side work and entrepreneurship strategy</h3>
An increasing number of people are choosing a multiple-career style of working, holding two or more jobs, each of which is considered a main job. Yoshigi is one of them.
“My corporate job and my own business are equally important. I didn’t want a side job—I wanted to start a business, so I established a corporation. I spend more time as an employee at a consulting firm, but in some months, my own company’s revenue exceeds my salary.”
At his consulting firm, he was promoted to manager at age 30 and currently oversees eight subordinates. Considering the general state of managerial promotions in Japanese companies, this can be described as a very rapid rise.
“The company has a discretionary labor system and remote work, so I can freely decide when and where I work. I could work from home, but considering the need to communicate with my team, I go into the office four days a week and work remotely one day.”
He founded his company the year before his promotion to manager, in 2023. It now has three core business pillars.
One is an online membership community for individuals called “Yoshigi Juku – AI × SNS Lab.” Based on his own experience of mastering AI and rapidly increasing his social media following in a short time, he provides know-how on accelerating careers through AI utilization and social media operation.
“I post weekly columns on AI and SNS usage, and hold weekly online study sessions. There are over 40 video contents, and I also publish customized GPTs and prompt templates for different purposes. We continuously add new content, and members can learn every day for less than 3,500 yen per month.”
Another business is corporate training and SNS consulting.
“In corporate training, I often serve as a lecturer on business skills such as project management and documentation (visualization and sharing of processes). When lecture requests come in, monthly revenue increases further.”
“Partnerships with companies and ambassador contracts are also part of the business. Through SNS posting, companies that provide AI tools sometimes approach me for ambassador agreements.”
<div data-friday-ad-slot="AD_inArticle"></div>
<h3>From a dream of professional baseball to entrepreneurship: a reversal story</h3>
Yoshigi says he once aimed to become a professional baseball player during his student years.
“I entered a strong university in the Tohto University Baseball League, but due to injuries I had to give up continuing as a baseball player. I had nothing else I wanted to do besides baseball, so losing the path to the pros was a major setback. That was when I seriously started thinking about what I should aim for next.”
The answer he arrived at was: living a happy life and building a happy family.
“So I asked myself what kind of life would be happy, what kind of life would feel fulfilling. While deeply confronting myself, I designed my life plan from my current position toward the future.”
After graduating from university, he chose employment at a major credit card company and worked there for five years. At age 27, he transferred to his current consulting firm.
“If I had just kept going, I probably would have become a top-tier credit card professional, but that wasn’t what I wanted. I wanted to put myself in an environment where I could grow more. And since consulting could also become an option for independence later, I chose it with my goal of starting a business in my 20s in mind.”
What was the motivation for starting a business in the first place?
“I want to enjoy life to the fullest,” he says again.
“I thought entrepreneurship sounded interesting. It felt strange to decide a company employee is better without ever experiencing being a manager or business owner. I decided to start a company in my 20s as part of my life experience.”
At that point, the business content was not yet decided. The priority was simply starting a company.
“First, I thought about what I could do that would help others. When I started sharing life planning, career changes, and career topics through blogs, YouTube, and X, my followers gradually increased. I realized many people don’t really do self-analysis or self-understanding.”
“What I might be able to contribute is helping people design their life paths. With that realization, I started turning things like career coaching and SNS marketing into actual businesses, and founded my company at 29.”
<div data-friday-ad-slot="AD_inArticle"></div>
<div data-friday-nextpage-lead="My ability to give directions and verbalize has improved dramatically..."></div>
<div class="expapp-yahoo-paragraph-break"></div>
<figure id="attachment_465774" class="wp-caption alignnone" style="width: 640px;" aria-describedby="caption-attachment-465774"><a href="#" data-ident_hash="94ab6034"><img src="https://res.cloudinary.com/fridaydigital/image/private/t_article_image/wpmedia/2026/04/f220382626a36dd2ee99c3d60f97a84f.jpg" alt=""></a><figcaption id="caption-attachment-465774" class="wp-caption-text">“I spend Saturday mornings as family time, playing with my children,” says Yoshigi (photo is for illustrative purposes).</figcaption></figure>
<h3>Managing multiple projects!</h3>
He started using ChatGPT immediately when it was introduced in November 2022.
“I’ve always liked new things like the latest gadgets and useful tools, so when ChatGPT came out, I immediately thought, ‘This is amazing,’ and jumped on it. Within a year, I think I had become able to use it properly in business.”
“At the time, there was no one around me actively using AI. I thought that if I could clearly explain what ChatGPT can do, it would be useful for businesspeople, so I decided to start sharing AI-based work techniques.”
That was in December 2024. Just over a year later, he achieved an annual income of over 20 million yen. “Without AI, it would have been impossible,” he says.
“Without AI, I couldn’t handle my current workload. As a manager at a consulting firm, my main job is designing entire projects. Normally, one person handles one project, but I handle three. I can do that because I fully utilize AI.
For example, when creating the outline of a presentation, it used to take me and my team a whole day. Then it would take another week to turn it into slides. With AI, I can complete the outline myself in about an hour. Then I hand it over to my team, and I can manage multiple projects at once.
The same goes for my own business. I hold weekly study sessions in my online community, and before using AI it would take more than two days to prepare 10–20 PowerPoint slides. Now I can create them in about an hour the day before the session.”
Yoshigi uses different AI tools depending on the task, including ChatGPT, Gemini, Claude, and NotebookLM. But what AI has given him goes beyond efficiency.
“I feel that my skills as a businessperson have improved. When using AI, you have to give detailed instructions—roles, context, tasks, constraints—and that has significantly improved my ability to instruct others and articulate ideas. My capacity has expanded.”
<div data-friday-ad-slot="AD_inArticle"></div>
<h3>Aiming for Koshien! A post-FIRE future plan</h3>
He also says AI has greatly contributed to his work-life balance.
“When I gave up my dream of becoming a professional baseball player, I planned my life: meet a good partner at 26, date for a year, live together for a year, and get married at 28. In reality, I met my wife at 26, got married at 27. It didn’t deviate much from the plan. I also planned to have two children, a boy and a girl, two years apart—and that also happened as planned.”
“I spend proper time with my family. In the mornings on weekdays, I help my children get dressed and brush their teeth, and we eat breakfast together. On remote work days, I also eat dinner with my family. On weekends, all three meals are with family.”
“Saturday mornings are dedicated to family time, playing with my kids. Once a month we go out as a family. There is also a wife’s free day once a month, and on that day I take care of the children.”
“I love my work, so outside of that, I’m working. The reason I can be deeply involved in childcare while focusing on multiple businesses is thanks to AI.”
According to his plan, he will move overseas at age 35, three years from now, likely to Southeast Asia.
“I haven’t decided exactly what I’ll do after moving. I’m already in a financial position where I could achieve FIRE (financial independence and early retirement), so I just want to do what I feel like doing. But I really like consulting work, so I might continue it.”
“Right now, work is like my hobby. I’d like to have real hobbies too. I want to try voice training, guitar, and get back into golf. I plan to increase the time and energy I spend on hobbies.”
He also has a plan for after returning to Japan.
“I plan to live overseas for about 15 years, and return to Japan when my children enter high school or university. After coming back, I want to become a high school baseball coach and aim for Koshien from age 50. I’m serious about it. I’ve already decided. I might return earlier than 50 depending on my wife’s wishes. Fifteen years into the future well, I honestly can’t be sure.”

 Sayuri Saito

 Afro (1st photo)

 A professional baseball player's dream failed, but he turned it around!　The "ultra-short AI work method" of a consulting manager who realized an annual income of over 20 million yen at the age of 32. He reveals the dramatic method that leads him to FIRE by securing time for his family even though his workload has tripled!

32-Year-Old Consultant Earning ¥20 Million Shares How AI Boosts Productivity and Work-Life Balance

Access Ranking