Japanese mid-career job seekers
Advertisementjapan.internet.com recently reported on a survey conducted by JR Tokai Express Research into the subject of job opening for mid-career job-seekers. At the start of February they interviewed 330 people between the ages of 30 and 69 employed in the private sector in some sort of personnel-related capacity. 69.4% of the sample was male, 41.5% in their thirties, 38.5% in their forties, 17.9% in their fifties, and 2.1% in their sixties.
As you have no doubt heard, Japanese firms tend to employ people under the assumption by both the employer and employee that it will be a job for life, although recently this trend has been changing, due to both firms wishing to reduce headcount and to people wanting to change. I think it wasn’t until about five years ago that my employer (one of the largest in Japan) first asked people if they wished to take early retirement or redundancy. The founder is regarded as a god of management who I suspect might be turning in his grave (or whatever the equivalent cliché is for the cremated) if he knew that one of the newest factories is mainly employing casual contract labour. I better shut up now before I get sacked…
UPDATE: Thanks to fukumimi for clearing up a rather fundamental mistake in my initial translation!
Research Results
As a side-note, according to a survey conducted by the Ministry of Health, Labour and Welfare in November of last year (sorry, no translation here) into the attitudes of people in their fifties to work, over 70% wanted to continue working even after they passed 60 years old and the official retiral age.
Q1: Within the last year, has your employer attempted to recruit middle-aged job seekers? (Sample size=330)
Yes (to SQs) 33.6% No 57.0% Don’t know 9.4% Q1SQ1: For what sort of job did your employer attempt to recruit middle-aged job seekers? (Sample size=111, multiple answer)
Votes Percentage Sales, office work, planning 48 43.2% Service, shop work 27 24.3% Technical (electrical, electronic, mechanical) 13 11.7% Technical (architecture, civil engineering) 10 9.0% Technical (foods, medical) 8 7.2% Specialist (consultant, financial, real estate) 6 5.4% Technical (software, networking) 3 2.7% Creative 1 0.9% Other 24 21.6% Q1SQ2: What means did your employer use when attempting to recruit middle-aged job seekers? (Sample size=111, multiple answer)
Votes Percentage Hello Work (government job agency) 68 61.3% Newspaper advertisements, supplements 32 28.8% Company home page 31 27.9% Job information magazine 26 23.4% Employment agency 24 21.6% Pay web site (pay for listings, free to search) 19 17.1% Asked contacts about unadvertised jobs 13 11.7% Free web site (both listings and search) 7 6.3% University or other educational establishments 6 5.4% PR magazine 2 1.8% Other 4 3.6% Don’t know 3 2.7%
Subscribe to feed