LEADERSHIP by Graham Womack
K yle wakamiya
Director of strategic planning and analysis Origin Materials
EDUCATION
More than five years into his career with Origin Materials , Kyle Wakamiya decided to make a change . He had been one of the first nonengineering or science hires in 2010 for West Sacramento-based Origin Materials , which makes environmentally friendly bioplastics . Coming from an accounting background , Wakamiya served informally as the startup ’ s chief financial officer . He wanted to stick with the company , but he wanted a change of pace . So after a brief stint around 2017 of living with his wife in Southern California and working remotely for Origin , the couple decided to pack up and move to Bishop , a small city 270 miles away from West Sacramento on the eastern side of the Sierra Nevada near the Nevada border . This is where Wakamiya , 36 , has served as
HEALTH CARE
the company ’ s director of strategic planning and analysis since 2018 . In his role , he helps his company by providing long-term projections . “ The way I like to describe it is making the argument for , ‘ Why does what
Vanessa Walker
we do today get us to the future that we want to get to ?’” Wakamiya says .
Wakamiya has also never been one to stick to linear paths too long in his career . After graduating from UC Irvine with a bachelor ’ s degree in economics and accounting in 2006 , he went to work for business consulting
MEDICAL DIRECTOR • Sutter Health Valley Area electronic ICU giant Deloitte before departing in 2009 . “ I decided that public accounting wasn ’ t the right place for me to have the rest of my career , and so , after a few years of that , I decided that I wanted to leave that space ,” Wakamiya says .
Having known Origin cofounder and co-CEO John Bissell since they attended Rio Americano High School outside Sacramento , Wakamiya went to work for Origin only two years after its launch in 2008 . Wakamiya helped the company develop its competitive analysis , capital projects forecast , market analysis and pricing . ( In 2013 , he was also a Nehemiah Emerging Leaders Fellow .) He has been an integral part of a company that ’ s grown to roughly 60- 70 employees in his decade-plus there and is nearing going public through a special purpose acquisition company transaction process .
The relatively young company has made plenty of mistakes along the way , Wakamiya says , but that ’ s just part of the growing process , and none of the mistakes were fatal . And he sees far too many young employees worried about saying the wrong thing instead of being willing to take risks and be innovative . “ The reality is that we ’ re going to be wrong ,” Wakamiya says . “ We ’ re almost always going to be wrong . But we can ’ t let the fear of being wrong like that be paralyzing .”
MURAL BY ALEXIS DIAZ
46 comstocksmag . com | July 2021