Embracing Change, Connecting Teams: How MUSE’s VPoE Builds Organizations That Scale
- 18 hours ago
- 6 min read
At MUSE, building robots is only part of the challenge. Building an organization that can continuously adapt and grow is just as important.
We spoke with Tsuyoshi, MUSE's Vice President of Engineering (VPoE), about his journey from becoming the company's very first employee to helping shape today's engineering organization. In this interview, he shares his approach to leadership, collaboration, and why solving the right problems often matters more than having a clearly defined job description.
– Could you tell us about your current role at MUSE?
As VPoE, my primary responsibility is overseeing our engineering organization and helping our teams work effectively together.
Alongside that, I also serve as the project manager for our cloud development team and help manage MUSE's internal IT infrastructure.
From the VPoE perspective, I spend a lot of time understanding what's happening across different teams, identifying issues that span multiple groups, and helping remove obstacles so the organization can continue moving forward.
Within the cloud team, I work with engineers to review development progress, prioritize upcoming work, and keep projects moving. More broadly, whenever a team encounters challenges that require coordination beyond their own group, I step in to help facilitate discussions and align priorities.
I also support our internal IT environment, including employee accounts, computers, business tools, and other systems that help everyone work efficiently. Sometimes that even means helping with production-related tasks or setting up new computers.
Looking at my title, it might seem like I'm wearing many different hats. In reality, I simply focus on whatever the organization needs most at any given time.
– Did you always plan to build a career that combined engineering leadership, project management, and IT?
Not at all.
I never had a specific career path in mind. My role evolved naturally by responding to whatever challenges needed attention.
Whenever I saw something that would stall unless someone stepped in, I tried to help. Over time, that gradually expanded the scope of my responsibilities.
Rather than leading dramatic organizational changes, I've spent most of my time solving one problem after another. Looking back, those small, continuous improvements naturally led me to where I am today.
– Have you felt your role expand during your time at MUSE?
I joined MUSE in 2022 as the company's first employee. Back then, I actually handled an even wider variety of work than I do today.
I built software for our robots, created production testing tools, and took on many tasks outside of software development. Since we were a very small team, there weren't rigid job boundaries. Everyone simply did whatever was necessary.
Interestingly, I don't think my role has become broader over time. As the company has grown and more people have joined, responsibilities have become better organized, and my own scope has actually become more focused.
That said, we're still a startup. There are plenty of situations where stepping beyond your formal role is the right thing to do. The difference today is that it's less about doing everything yourself and more about helping fill the gaps so the organization as a whole can succeed.
– MUSE has team members with different nationalities, work styles, and areas of expertise. How does that diversity influence your daily work?
One of MUSE's greatest strengths is the diversity of our people.
We have employees from many different countries, along with contractors and interns. Some work in Japan, while others are based overseas. Our team varies widely in age, professional background, working style, and employment type.
The work itself is equally diverse. Building robots requires expertise across software, hardware, cloud infrastructure, embedded systems, manufacturing, quality assurance, and customer success. Each discipline brings a different perspective.
Because of that, it's important not to assume everyone shares the same context or way of thinking.
Communication styles, decision-making processes, reporting methods, and even the meaning of certain words can differ from person to person. That means we often spend more time explaining, confirming, and aligning expectations.
Although that takes extra effort, it also creates opportunities to discover viewpoints or ideas that might never have emerged otherwise.
To me, diversity isn't simply about having people from different backgrounds. It fundamentally shapes how we work together every day.
That's why I believe two things are equally important: making a genuine effort to understand others while also communicating your own thoughts clearly. It's not always easy, but I think MUSE has steadily become better at it.
– Since you work across engineering, projects, and internal IT, what stands out about MUSE's culture?
One thing I appreciate is how willing people are to help beyond their formal responsibilities.
Everyone has their own role, of course. But if someone notices a problem or sees an opportunity to help, they're usually willing to step in or offer suggestions.
What I value even more is the feeling that speaking up can actually make a difference.
When people believe nothing will change, they eventually stop sharing ideas.
At MUSE, people regularly raise issues they've noticed, and many of those suggestions turn into real improvements. As the company grows, I'd like us to preserve that culture.
– What kinds of situations make you think, "Someone needs to step in here"?
The hardest problems are usually the ones that cross organizational boundaries.
For example, issues between the business team and engineering, or projects involving multiple engineering teams, often need someone to connect the dots before progress can continue.
Sometimes the business team has certain goals, while engineering faces technical constraints or different priorities. Those situations aren't about deciding who's right or wrong. The first step is understanding what each side is seeing.
It's also common for similar concerns to reach me through different people at around the same time. When that happens, I try to quickly understand the situation, bring the right people together, and clarify the real issue.
At the same time, I've learned that not every problem requires immediate action.
Sometimes, if you give it a little time, the issue resolves naturally or circumstances change.
So these days, I try to distinguish between problems that require immediate intervention and those that simply need observation. Rather than making assumptions, I prefer listening carefully before deciding how to act.
– As the organization evolves, what do you pay the most attention to in communication?
The biggest thing is avoiding assumptions.
Everyone has different personalities, strengths, communication styles, and ways of expressing themselves. In a diverse environment like MUSE, relying only on your own interpretation can easily lead to misunderstandings.
When working with others, I try to understand why they're saying something and what challenges they're actually facing.
I also think it's important to separate facts from interpretations. Once you understand what's objectively happening, it becomes much easier to decide what should happen next.
That said, facts alone aren't enough.
People also have concerns, frustrations, and uncertainties. Ignoring those emotions may produce a logically correct solution, but it doesn't always help people move forward together.
So I try to understand both the facts and the people involved.
– How have your previous experiences influenced the way you work today?
In previous companies, I often worked in leadership positions.
Back then, though, I had a tendency to take on too much responsibility myself.
Having a strong sense of ownership is important, but I believed I had to solve everything on my own. As a result, I wasn't very good at asking others for help.
Today, I think much more carefully about where my time creates the most value.
Rather than trying to do everything myself, I've learned the importance of trusting teammates, delegating responsibilities, and relying on others.
Because I've experienced the downside of carrying too much alone, I now place much greater value on building strong teams.
My goal isn't to solve every problem personally. It's to help the team succeed together.
– What kind of organization do you hope MUSE becomes as it continues to grow?
One thing I hope we never lose is the feeling that speaking up can lead to real change.
As organizations grow, it naturally becomes harder for ideas to reach decision-makers, and decisions often take longer. Valuable suggestions from the people closest to the work can easily be overlooked.
That's why I believe it's important to continuously listen to the people around us, understand what's challenging them, and improve what we can.
Rather than pursuing large-scale transformations all at once, I think MUSE is at its best when we make small, continuous improvements over time.
Our team is international, highly specialized, and spread across different locations and working styles. Because of that, I don't think there's a single "correct" way of working.
Instead, I hope we remain an organization that's flexible enough to adapt as circumstances change—and one that can preserve that flexibility even as we scale.
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We’re growing our team. MUSE is currently hiring for a variety of positions across engineering, business, and corporate fields.
If our vision excites you, and you’re interested in the challenge of creating the future from scratch, we’d love to hear from you. Casual meetings and office tours are always welcome!
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