Sustainability - HR Development
As society matures, people’s values are diversifying and the forms of happiness they seek and the ways they work are changing. At Meiden Group, we see our Employees as human capital. To maximize its corporate performance, the Group needs to enhance each employee’s abilities (A) and motivation (M) and create opportunities(O), and environments where all employees can play an active role. This AMO framework is the basis of the Meiden Group’s thinking about human capital.
Transform the training system from company-led to proactivity of trainees, aiming to develop human resources with the autonomy to think and act on their own.
We implement many training programs to encourage employee growth in different aspects as an employee, member of society, and professional.
The Medium-Term Management Plan 2024 aims to strengthen human capital in conjunction with sustainability management, and will focus on further human resource development so that diverse human resources can accept each other's individuality and make the most of their abilities. As part of this, we are promoting growth through opportunities to work with diverse personnel, such as our system of bringing overseas local staff to Japan for study, coaching programs at overseas subsidiaries, the foreign trainee system, and the overseas assignment system.
We are also enhancing our innovation education so that employees have the creativity and drive to try new things without being trapped by conventional ideas and methods, and fostering an environment conducive to innovation. For example, we are making opportunities to challenge and play an active role as a member of the Business Development Division, which recruits employees from within the company to try creating and launching new businesses.
This training facilitates understanding of the roles, abilities and skills required of each age group or qualification level. Smooth growth and implementation are expected from this training.
This training hones the way of thinking, skills, and practical abilities to solve management problems with the aim of enhancing management capabilities.
This training teaches the knowledge and skills necessary for employees to achieve their own career goals.
This training teaches product knowledge according to the technical level of the employee.
When the prescribed correspondence course is completed, we will cover 60% of course fees or the full amount if completed with high grades.
We provide incentives for acquiring prescribed public qualifications at the time of acquisition.
Meidensha strives to respect individual diversity and draw out each employee’s independence and motivation. To that end, we have launched “My Vision/My Challenge,” an initiative for employees to reflect on their own life vision, compare it to the company’s vision, and put into words what challenges they will take on in the company (“My Challenge”). In FY2022, members of upper management put their “My Vision/My Challenge” into words.
Also, the program is scheduled to be expanded to executive officers and managements, in FY2023.
Meidensha has long provided technical training to help employees acquire specialized skills and improve their practical abilities. However, in order to strengthen the technical skills of younger employees, we have been providing training since 2018 for both technical and administrative staff to learn about electricity, which is essential for understanding Meidensha's technologies and products. In FY2019, we added ICT training, and we have been providing training on ICT fundamentals and design thinking, which will be crucial to achieving digital transformation. The following are initiatives we stepped up in FY2022.
The technical training center Manabi-ya, located at the Numazu Works, is intended for the early development of engineers and the passing on of technology and skills. It provides technical and skills training, led mainly by experienced employees, and programs for the systematic training of engineers and raising the level of their work. Maintenance engineers in particular study for one year at the technical training center to learn maintenance skills. The center also offers experience-based training using virtual reality (VR), augmented reality (AR), and mixed reality (MR). We are making increasing use of these tools for safety and technical training. In FY2022, we enhanced our VR and AR training, for example by producing new training content on the structure of wind power generation equipment (nacelles).
We offer the Career Development Management Program, a new training program to systematically and strategically develop the next generation of personnel.
We aim to develop personnel that can think and act with a broad perspective and outlook that exceed the bounds of their own areas of specialty and roles by selecting and recruiting young and mid-level personnel to attend business school and engage in professional exchange with people outside of their own business divisions, factories, and business units, engage in personal exchange with overseas subsidiaries and Japanese subsidiaries, and engage in cultural exchange through placement outside of the Group and at government institutions, etc.
We have also newly added a young employee program to selective training in order to systematically develop the next generation of management personnel for the medium to long term.
In addition, by introducing the Innovation Professional Development Program for the next generation of management and having them experience different fields with various human resources development measures, we aim to enhance their creativity by helping trainees absorb a variety of knowledge and broaden their experience, as well as to foster an innovation mindset.
We also train the general managers of each business on the knowledge and skills they need in the current management environment. These include finance and accounting training, which is essential for accurate decision-making, and training in unconscious bias, psychological safety, and anger management as part of promoting DEI. We also send general managers to outside seminars to build up their organizational capabilities.
Since FY2018, the Meiden Group has been conducting a Japanese exchange program for local staff (employees of overseas subsidiaries) in order to develop personnel who are candidates for leadership positions at overseas subsidiaries. The program includes interaction with Meidensha management, observations at Japanese sites and factories to which products are delivered, and on-the-job training at various workplaces for the purpose of increasing preparedness to take on leadership roles and the knowledge necessary for top management positions in the Meiden Group. We also offer coaching programs with the aim of organizational development, focusing on executive candidates from overseas subsidiaries. This Group-wide interaction of personnel and creating personal connections will bring the Meiden Group together.
We conduct a rotation system to systematically develop young employees. Based on a rotation model, individuals share their career plans with their workplaces and the HR Department, and we implement rotation through regular interviews, etc. Having young employees experience a variety of jobs supports early development of their ability and raises their awareness of career formation.
Also, as people’s values grow more diverse, employees are becoming less passive about their careers and more self-reliant. For that reason, Meiden Group established a new specialized Career Consultation Service in FY2022. Employees of all ages are free to use the service, and we are stepping up support so that every employee can further demonstrate their abilities and play an active role in the company.
In FY2016, we introduced the MFC mentor system for the purpose of strengthening internal connections between young employees and building an atmosphere of professional development. The MFC stands for “Meiden Family Chain” with the idea that staff would form a supportive familial bond where they would support each other like links in a chain. We refer mentors as “seniors” and mentees as “juniors.” We also have groups consisting of multiple pairs, which we call them “families,” that create bonds that go beyond divisions and business units. We provide further impetus to activities by holding social events for families, and by establishing a Promotion Committee for young employees to plan and implement company-wide activities.
