Japan’s employment system and human resource management – coping with increasing adjustment pressures

ABSTRACT

This introduction introduces the four papers of the special issue and places them in the wider context of the changes and challenges that Japan’s employment and HR systems have been confronting. The paper first discusses major challenges Japanese companies and the Japanese economy face such as labor shortage, low productivity and womenomics and the problems of recruiting skilled labor. After this, the paper discusses the interrelatedness of these issues and how the papers presented in this special issue provide new insights into these topics. Finally, the paper gives a brief assessment of how the Covid-19 pandemic, which happened after the project had started and which is therefore not reflected in the individual papers, has impacted work and employment in Japan.

KEYWORDS:

• Japan’s employment system
• HR
• human resource management
• Japan
• Lifetime Employment

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Parissa Haghirian

Parissa Haghirian is Professor of International Management at Sophia University in Tokyo, Japan. She has lived and worked in Japan since 2004 and is an internationally renowned expert in international management practices with a focus on Japan.