LinkedIn Japan Head urges shift to skills-based employment

TOKYO, JAPAN — Wakana Tanaka, LinkedIn Japan’s first female country head, stressed the necessity for Japan to shift towards a skills-based labor market and adapt to the evolving values of workers, especially in the context of ongoing gender inequality.

In a Bloomberg interview, Tanaka said that Japan is at a turning point where constant skill-building is becoming a priority. 

She noted that the local labor market gravitates towards a skill-focused environment, diverging from the traditional lifetime employment system that incentivizes employees through corporate loyalty and not taking too much risk.

This transformation, Tanaka added, should allow more opportunities for diversity and an increase in wages for women. 

The Japanese government has also been pushing for skill-based employment, setting aside a budget of ¥1 trillion (US$7.3 billion) for over five years to reskill people who want to switch to higher-paying jobs.

The LinkedIn Japan chief added that firms need to adapt to changing attitudes among workers who value family life and flexibility more than they did in the past.

“We just did research last month on Japanese people, and compared to 20 years ago, across the generations, people value families the most important, not work. [Twenty] years ago, it used to be work,” she noted.