Human Resource Development / Promotion of Diversity

We aim to achieve the highest productivity in the industry and then improve even further. To this end, we have set operating income per employee as a key indicator and are focusing on developing “T-shaped human resources" who can achieve high productivity. A “T-shaped human resource” is someone who is an expert in a certain task or field, but also has a wide range of work skills that allow them to excel in other fields.

On-the-job training (OJT) is the cornerstone of our efforts to develop T-shaped human resources. We place employees into jobs with a sense of respect for their aptitude and professional aspirations, and we support each employee to become a true expert in their assigned job. For this reason, the Company does not implement one-size-fits-all personnel transfers or so-called routine reassignments. By having employees thoroughly study the work they are responsible for, we focus on developing employees with high levels of work ability.

The Group's business partners are spread around the world, with overseas sales now accounting for approximately 80% of consolidated sales. For this reason, we have long been working to develop human resources who can play an active role on the global stage. In addition to sending young employees to experience working overseas, we also help employees working in Japan acquire an international mindset by assigning them to work with overseas business partners.

In addition to OJT, we offer a variety of training programs for different stages of growth to help employees expand their knowledge and skills beyond their areas of expertise. These training programs include internationalization training in English and other languages, management training, and AI talent development training.

Under our performance-based personnel system, employees set ambitious work goals and improvement targets at the beginning of each half year, and are then encouraged to grow by challenging themselves to achieve these goals. Supervisors provide advice and guidance to help employees achieve their goals, and at the end of the half year, employees are evaluated on the degree to which they achieved them. At the same time, employees' abilities, potential for growth, and attitude toward their work are taken into consideration to help motivate them and encourage them to grow. In this way, with OJT as the cornerstone, we are promoting the development of “T-shaped human resources” through the personnel system that emphasizes performance and ability and conduct the assignment, training, promotion, and evaluation of personnel.

In addition to human resource development, we believe that being able to work in a flexible way that respects work-life balance is essential for the growth of human resources. We have put in place systems that allow employees to deal flexibly with various matters that occur in their lives, such as marriage, childbirth, childcare, treatment of illness, and nursing care. These company initiatives have inspired a greater sense of belonging among employees and a greater willingness for employees to voluntarily contribute to the growth of the company.

Our Group companies overseas also follow the same approach to human resource development described here, and strive to respect the diversity of each country's laws, regulations, customs, human resources and culture.

In this way, we have decided that continuing to increase operating income per employee is key metric for the Company, and we are promoting compassionate human resource development to achieve this. As a result, the growth rate of operating income in recent years has greatly exceeded the growth rate of the number of employees, and the productivity per employee has also increased significantly.