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Toshiba Selected as Award Winner for 2013 "Diversity Management Selection 100"

5 Apr, 2013

* Due to the accounting issue revealed in 2015, Toshiba voluntarily returned the award to Japan's Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry (METI) in March 2016.

Image of "Diversity Management Selection 100"

Toshiba Corporation was an award winner in Japan's Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry's (METI) newly established "Diversity Management Selection 100".

Diversity management is a strategy under which enterprises conduct management so as to create innovation and generate value, by utilizing various human resources and providing them with opportunities where they are able to exercise their potential as much as possible. In Diversity Management Selection 100, enterprises that proactively make efforts to carry out diversity management are recognized as having a management capability that contributes to Japan's economic growth. The practices of award winning enterprises will be introduced as best practices to accelerate diversity activities in Japan.

Toshiba established the "Kirameki Life & Career Promotion Office" to promote gender equality in 2004, and subsequently widened its remit to cover diversity and expanding the recruitment base to include more females, foreigners and people with disabilities. The division also promotes measures to enable employees to achieve their full potential, whatever their attributes.

Below is a list of the key measures that the company has taken since 2004.

Key measures

  • Established "Kirameki Life & Career Promotion Office" directly under the CEO to promote gender equality in 2004. In 2007, the company reorganized the office as the "Diversity Development Division," extending its scope to the promotion of diversity.
  • Established the post of Chief Diversity Officer (CDO) in FY2010. Mr. Hidejiro Shimomitsu, Corporate Senior Executive Vice President has been CDO since June 2012.
  • Diversity Strategy Committee meets every fiscal half, chaired by the CDO. Presidents of in-house companies and major Group companies discuss diversity issues.
  • Diversity Development Division shifts goal from quantity to quality, reinforces measures to promote diversity to enable all employees to achieve their full potential.
  • Diversity positioned as management strategy and addressed in top management messages to employees and society.
  • Key performance indicators (KPI) established to support proactive recruitment of females, the disabled and foreigners.
  • Special courses to train female employees to become management candidates, "Kirameki-juku," held in 2005 and 2006. Completed by over 200 women, many of whom became managers.
  • Career education course for female employees with 5 to 10 years of career experience, to cultivate their potential to become managers.
  • Upgraded company work-family balance systems to a level exceeding Japan's legal standards. Measures include extension of maternity leave period to three years and short-time regular employment until the child reaches sixth grade in junior school, establishment of career return system for employees who have resigned because of spouse's business transfer or to provide nursing care, and an in-company child-care center "Kirame-kids."
  • Promotion of Work Style Innovation (WSI) activities since 2007, to support diverse work styles.

    * WSI: Toshiba activities aimed at creating a positive spiral, where employees work very hard and efficiently and also make the most of their private live, to rejuvenate and improve themselves so that they can add higher value to their work.

  • Publishing an internal magazine, "Kirameki", and newspaper, "Kirameki Times", and holding an in-house forum, "Kirameki Forum", all to promote cultural reform, since 2004.
  • Promoted personal empowerment initiatives for people with disabilities: established a special subsidiary, "Toshiba With"; set up a network connecting seven divisions involved in supporting people with disabilities; provided training for members of groups that have hearing-impaired employees; set up a sign language club where hearing impaired employees teach signing to other employees.
  • Universal Design Advisor system promoted since 2007, allowing disabled employees interested in UD to register as UD Advisors; promotes UD activities and accelerate development of UD products.
  • Published GID (gender identity disorder) manual in 2012.
  • Provide foreign employees with a well-developed Japanese language training course and follow-up programs for first three years of employment. Assessments of foreign employees and their managers are carried out annually and best practices extended to other divisions.
  • Launched employment extension system in response to aging population in 2001.

Toshiba promotes measures that encourage all employees to achieve their full potential. By converting diversity into vital energy for growth, Toshiba will strive to become a global contender.

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