PlayNext Lab, a Tokyo-based technology startup, took an unusual step last year when it launched a hiring campaign. It targeted women with young children when it hired.
After several failed attempts to hire applicants, all men, the move was prompted by larger, more well-known competitors who lured them away before the interview phase. Only 60 employees were considered too small for top-ranking agencies.
PlayNext, a mobile application and game development company, faced similar challenges when it was established four years ago.
The solution was to hire engineers from abroad, who now account to 80 percent of the country’s workforce. This is in a country where immigration has been debated to fill its declining population.
The company hired two women to work for it this time. They wanted to pursue careers, but were also limited by family commitments.
“We felt we could win [against other employers] because there are many Japanese companies that avoid women who cannot work long hours,” says Shinichi Ide, an executive at PlayNext.
A severe labour shortage, which saw a drop in unemployment to 2.2% in December, and an ageing society are forcing companies into a rethinking of their working practices. This includes a tighter limit on overtime hours.
That has emboldened women to pursue more ambitious career opportunities, backed by prime minister Shinzo Abe’s campaign to redress Japan’s ingrained gender inequality, dubbed “womenomics”.
Japan’s female workers have been a long-standing source of talent. Many women have had to drop their ambitions due to a lack of caregivers and day care facilities. Nearly half of women quit their jobs after having a first child.
Japanese female participation has reached a record high of 71 per cent — higher than in the US and Europe — while the ratio of jobs on offer to applicants was at 1.60 in 2019, the highest level since the early 1970s.
Policymakers face a major challenge: increasing the number of women working full-time. According to the government, 56% of women still work in part-time, lower-paying jobs.
The latest OECD figures reveal that Japanese women earn 25 percent less than their male counterparts, making them the second-largest gender pay gap among OECD nations.
Shoko Awamura, 28 years old, returned to work at a property development company after her second child was born in 2018. She soon realized that her prospects of holding a managerial role were slim because she couldn’t work after 5pm. “The biggest reason why I changed jobs was because I wanted to build my career even as I raised my children,” Ms Awamura says.
After searching for a job, she joined Renoveru, a Tokyo-based start-up in real estate. She works from 8am to 5pm. The best-performing employee in her department is a woman who never works extra hours or during the weekend, she says: “I found a role model that I should aim for.”
A recruitment agency that focuses on women with young children and who are unable to work long hours provided the new job.
Yodai Sakai, general manager at ecommerce-to-recruitment group BBO, which has provided the women-focused service for nearly a year, says many female applicants are willing to move from a big employer to a start-up if it might lead to better career prospects.
Japan offers one of the best parental leave benefits in the entire world. Workers have the option to extend their one-year leave for six months if they are unable to find childcare. But that often means the women do not regain their position or fall off the company’s career ladder when they return.
“Some of these women find themselves moved to a completely different department and their pay gets dropped to an entry level position due to shorter working hours,” Mr Sakai says. “They see little prospect of expanding their career and choose to change jobs.”
One of BBO’s own staff, Kaori Tanaka, quit her accounting job at a big listed Japanese company after getting married, and was hired by the agency shortly after the birth of her first child.
“A start-up was perfect for me because you basically had to do everything on your own,” the 36-year-old says, explaining that she enjoys the chance to take more responsibility.
Finding new, more family-friendly jobs remains a challenge, she adds, “but once you go out and seek information, there are job opportunities out there”.
Source: Financial Times
