In investing in human capital at the group level, we grow and strengthen our leadership and group governance capabilities, which help us pursue our brand promise and Perfect and Unique Tagging in line with our medium-term management plan.
Appoint executives through our board's advisory committee
With the support of our board's Nomination & Remuneration Advisory Committee, we assess candidates based on a set of selection criteria to appoint internal directors and executive officers who demonstrate strong leadership in running our business sustainably and driving SATO Values.
Develop talent through a specialized committee
The HR Development Committee we established under our Nomination Advisory Committee in FY 2022 helps our executive team review and decide on human capital management strategies and actions. It looks into succession planning together with the Nomination Advisory Committee, while also working to reinforce HR action plans that ensure diversity and foster key personnel for executing strategies and maintaining business continuity.
Introduce a globally integrated HR framework
(1) Quarterly global HR synergy meetups
Every quarter, we engage HR personnel from across our group companies in online meetings where we align our direction and communicate, promote and monitor shared initiatives, with the support of our Global HR Department in Japan.
(2) Global learning platform
We launched a learning management system called E.D.G.E in FY 2021. This name selected in-house is an acronym for “Engage, Develop, Grow and Evolve,” which explains the employee learning journey, starting from first engaging with the contents, to ultimately evolving and changing into a better version of themselves.
This e-learning system for building knowledge and skills is run on different platforms in and outside Japan due to language differences. All overseas subsidiaries were onboarded in FY 2022. Besides boasting a growing lineup of in-house and third-party courses, the system also offers many functions, such as those for administrators and learners to manage group trainings and track learning progress, serving as a cornerstone for continuous talent development across different departments.
Human resource development (Our global learning system: E.D.G.E)
(3) English promotion activities
To globalize our business, we have been actively promoting and supporting the use and learning of the English language in Japan since 2012, requiring employees to take CASEC (online test to evaluate English proficiency) annually starting 2013.
From FY 2022, we decided to expand the activity beyond Japan to other non-English speaking countries, while gearing it more toward employees who need it more. We are also incorporating the latest language e-learning tools and other effective channels to better support learning and development and enhance employee engagement globally.
Enhance governance of overseas subsidiaries
In FY 2021, we introduced a global grading system for managers at our overseas subsidiaries under the lead of our Global HR Department in Japan, while benchmarking compensation in each country. Starting FY 2022, we now collect data on salary standards in different countries, using it as a basis to revise compensation for locally hired managers heading our overseas subsidiaries and when hiring or setting compensation amounts for top-level management.
Additionally, we started leadership development programs to systematically identify and foster key employees, taking the first step in FY 2022 to conduct executive assessments on locally-hired managers to understand their strengths, weaknesses and opportunities for growth. A simplified version of the same assessment is also being rolled out to senior managers and higher ranks in Japan. We plan to match managers to trainings, stretch assignments and midterm placements/appointments based on their assessment results while expanding the scope of leadership development to cover more managers in and outside Japan.
