PokeEarn Interview Makiko Otsuka | PokeEarn Official Site | PokeEarn

Otsuka, who joined a company straight out of school in 2003, spent fulfilling days in an environment where she was evaluated regardless of gender or age, but gradually anxiety about the future began to flicker.

"I was genuinely absorbed in my work, but around the age of 30 I began to notice senior colleagues leaving the company, saying things like 'I want to be in a workplace where I can keep working even after I marry and have children,' or 'I want to work somewhere that evaluates me, not just the hours I put in.' Your twenties are fine, when you can devote all your time to work, but everyone around me was working long hours, and if some life event came up and your working hours got shorter, it was an environment where, even if you felt you were delivering results, you started to worry whether you were being fairly evaluated."

Puzzled, Otsuka surveyed the wider environment outside her own company and came to know the reality that at every Japanese company you could not keep working while being fairly evaluated unless you sacrificed your time.

"I was stunned to realize that the very fact that being able to work long hours had become the precondition for a good evaluation was a problem for society as a whole, and I felt strongly that it had to change. So I decided to start a company that supports work-style reform together with our CEO, Komuro."

The company the two of them founded after studying ways of working together is called, fittingly, Work-Life Balance Co., Ltd.

"Even though Japan has so many talented women, once they reach a certain age, society stops being able to make use of their abilities. I thought the concept of work-life balance (hereafter 'WLB'), which was getting attention in the West at the time, would be the key."

She started her company in 2006, when terms like 'work-style reform' and 'WLB' had not yet taken hold. She began by supporting women employees returning to work from childcare leave.

"Both Komuro and I are women, so we started our business using those needs as a foothold, but we soon realized that, regardless of gender, long working hours were the cause of many problems."

Japan today is in a demographic onus period^*For an organization to grow, drawing on the varied abilities of people of every age and gender is essential. That is why long working hours do not fit. What I had known only as knowledge appeared right in front of me as a real challenge.
＊Demographic onus period: a state in which the working-age population shrinks and the population structure holds back economic growth. In Japan, owing to the falling birthrate and aging society, the working-age population peaked in 1995 and has declined year by year since.

"We started our work-style reform consulting by explaining that long working hours are a minus for growth. First, we ourselves devised ways to cut our working hours: everyone left the office by six and used 100% of their paid leave. Reducing working hours is not easy, so it takes all kinds of ingenuity. We then offered that ingenuity to our clients as know-how."

Otsuka has worked on work-style reform for roughly 20 years. WLB is gradually taking hold, but she says misunderstandings are still deep-rooted.

"Many people picture only a balance between 'work' and 'family.' But regardless of whether you have a family, everyone has a life. For example, time spent learning outside of work, or managing your health so you can deliver results, is part of that too. Enriching that life gives you energy and ideas, which you then return to your work. This synergy is the essence of WLB."

However, Otsuka says the synergy does not happen all at once.

"When an organization gives time back to employees who used to work long hours, I first recommend that they rest properly. Once they have rested, the next step is to play. By engaging with things that interest them in their own way, they start to get ideas. When the playing settles down, they begin to study and build up skills. The synergy happens in stages like that. Giving time back as early as possible ultimately benefits the organization."

The know-how for cutting working hours is wide-ranging, but according to Otsuka the easiest thing for any organization to take on is 'planning out your day.'

"Every morning when I get in, I plan out which tasks I will do and from what time to what time, and when I leave I look back on it. It raises your awareness of finishing on time, and the review helps you discover surprising waste. In my experience, this alone can cut overtime by about 20%."

Raising 'psychological safety' within the organization also becomes important.

"To shorten working hours, people in the organization need to help one another as they get the work done. For that, it is best to have an environment where each member feels secure and can proactively share information. At our company, for instance, we do not ask the reason for taking paid leave. That is to prevent people from falling into the mindset of, 'I would rather work than have to explain why I am off.'"

Improving productivity is essential to achieving work-style reform and making WLB stick. To that end, what Otsuka has been paying particular attention to lately is 'the sleep of working people.'

"According to one study, people can stay focused for up to 13 hours after waking, and after that their concentration drops to a level no different from being drunk."

She says that a separate survey of 700 companies produced the result that companies whose employees slept longer had higher ROE (return on equity).

"Japanese organizations have pushed themselves by cutting into their sleep, but it turns out that actually getting proper sleep leads to better business performance."

Otsuka is also paying attention to the effect sleep has on mental health.

"It seems you need seven to eight hours of sleep to maintain your mental health. Also, leaders who sleep less are said to tend to be harsher in their dealings with people, so the higher your position, the more important it is to be mindful of both the quality and quantity of your sleep."

To secure seven to eight hours of sleep, cutting overtime, in other words work-style reform, becomes important.

"In the end, I think what matters is that the whole organization, and especially the executive and management layers, switch to the mindset of raising efficiency and reducing working hours."