Recent news

Latest items of recent news relevant to Japan as reported in our fortnightly newswire ‘Dernières nouvelles’.

Japan: NTT to adopt merit-based personnel system

Nippon Telegraph and Telephone Corporation (NTT) are breaking free from the traditional seniority system …

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Japan: Hitachi to scale back locations

Over the next 18 months, Hitachi will reduce its office footprint in Tokyo and Kanagawa Prefectures by 20% …

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Japan: Digital education programme for Japan Airlines employees

Japan Airlines (JAL) has decided to introduce a digital education programme for all its 36,000 employees, staring next year …

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Japan: Bill to protect freelancers

A new law is to be debated this Autumn that will give freelancers the right to have a written contract that clearly specifies the work to be undertaken …

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Japan: New salary card option in the pipeline

As things stand, the Labour Standards Law stipulates that salaries must be paid strictly in cash, although companies are allowed to pay salaries into accounts held at banks and other financial institutions …

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Japan: Nippon Paper extends its human rights policy

The company has had in place a human rights policy since 2004 …

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Japan: May a contract employee be dismissed during their fixed-term period?

It is often assumed that contract (fixed-term) employees may be easily dismissed at any time because their employment relationship has the character of a “non-regular employee” …

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Japan: Minimum wage to hit 961 yen under largest hike yet offered

Although consumer price inflation rose by only 2 …

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Japan: Many scientists’ jobs at risk from labor law loophole

Thousands of Japan’s most talented scientific researchers will, from next Spring, be forced to look for work – frequently outside the country …

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Japan: Is the Peter Principle perverting the cultural work ethic?

The management consulting firm Shikigaku recently conducted a survey of 300 employees aged 20-39 working for primarily medium sized companies …

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Japan: NTT group to allow 30,000 employees to work remotely

The telecom giant Nippon Telegraph (NTT) is opening up remote working for 30,000 of its employees …

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Japan: Gender pay gap report

The Act on Promotion of Female Advancement requires that those companies employing 300+ employees shall become obliged to reveal their gender pay gaps …

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Japan: Some graduates struggle to find right job fit

University graduates are not primarily concerned with employee benefits when they seek their first job …

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Japan: New travel rules as foreign tourists to be let in

The government opened its borders to business travellers on 1st March 2022 and has since been slowly expanding the types of visitors being allowed to enter …

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Japan: Mitsubishi Electric admits to falsifying data over 40 years

An independent panel has discovered that around 70% of domestic production at Mitsui Electric plants was subject to QC omissions or falsifications …

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