Yahoo Japan eyes introduction of 4-day workweek for all staff

Yahoo Japan eyes introduction of 4-day workweek for all staff. September. 26, 2016 07:09. by 도쿄=장원재특파원 peacechaos@donga.com.

Yahoo Japan, the Japanese IT company under Softbank, is considering introduction of four-day workweek for all staff. The Japanese media reported on Saturday that Yahoo Japan CEO Manabu Miyasaka recently informed employees of the plan.

Yahoo Japan plans to allow its staff to use holidays freely on any day of the week, while maintaining the current five-day workweek system for now. Then, the company is to push to introduce four-day workweek system for its entire staff of about 5,800 in phases within several years. The company plans to decide on how to adjust employee salaries later.

In an interview with Kyoto News on Saturday, Miyasaka said, “Working hours and labor productivity is an important theme in business management, and there are issues to address, but I wish to try.” The Mainichi Shimbun said, “There is a case in which Fast Retailing, which operates Uniqlo, introduced four-day workweek for its employees in provincial regions, but it is quite unusual that a big company is introducing the system for regular employees at the head office.”

Yahoo Japan's introduction of the reformative workweek system has been made to attract talented manpower, while blocking employees from quitting due to childrearing and nursing.

There have been efforts to innovate the work system in Japan these days. Toyota introduced a telecommuting system, in which employees are only required to come to office once a week. The banking community, which tends to be conservative, is also fast expanding the number of employees working from home.

Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, who promotes society where all 100 million people are active, is urging Japanese people including married women to get jobs, while making improvement in the practice of long workhours in Japan, including restriction to the number of night overtime hours.