Creating an environment that fosters innovation

We create an organizational culture that is flat, open, and conducive to easy communication, and we work to create an environment where resources can be allocated to innovation initiatives.

In order to create an organizational culture in which all human resources can continue to work with vitality, the company has introduced the Management Vision Achievement Program for managers and assistant managers from FY2022. The purpose of this program is to further strengthen the purpose-driven culture where employees work and act to achieve the corporate vision and the Medium-term Management Plan, while instilling a flexible culture that respects individuality and diversity and ensures psychological safety.

In addition to this, we also plan and implement various exchange events with the aim of creating a flat, bottom-up organizational culture that is open and conducive to collaborative creation. Specifically, we hold events such as "meetings to talk with board members," where executives and employees can interact directly, networking events for mid-career hires and between group companies, and exchange meetings with other companies.

In the railway operations department, we are striving to create workplaces where all human resources can work with vitality through "training to create a workplace that nurtures people" that teaches workplace managers and supervisors how to create workplaces with high psychological safety, as well as through mentor interviews.

To drive innovation and development of new businesses throughout the Nankai Group, we have been running the Business Creation Support Program since FY2019. The three in-house venture businesses created through this program have been selected for two consecutive years in FY2021 and FY2022 by the Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry for the Subsidy for Projects to Help Human Resources of Major Companies Create New Businesses (a project to help secondees create start-ups).

In addition, in FY2022, we started the "beyond the Border" Business Creation Support Program with the aim of soliciting ideas and human resources from outside the company to support business promotion. The unique feature of this initiative is that, for projects that have been approved for commercialization, the external proposer is hired as an employee of the company to promote the business.

It was highly evaluated as an excellent initiative that could be a new recruitment method different from conventional approaches, and it won the Excellence Award in the recruitment category of the 13th Japan HR Challenge Awards.