We aspire to be a company that grows by openly accepting and working with people having different characteristics and values.
Guided by the corporate philosophy of kyosei, Canon believes in the importance of allowing individual employees with varied personalities and values to fulfil their potential by playing an active role, without restricting opportunities. In line with this thinking, we respect diversity of culture, customs, language, and ethnicity, and actively encourage fair recruitment and deployment of employees, regardless of gender, age or disability.
Canon Inc. established Vital workforce and Value Innovation through Diversity (VIVID) in 2012 as a horizontally integrated organization to help promote diversity across the company. Headed by the CFO of Canon Inc. and governed by its own policies, VIVID is engaged in a range of initiatives.
These policies are published on Canon’s home page and the Intranet.
Two themes of our pro-diversity policies are “Promoting the Active Participation of Women” and “Encouraging Men to Participate in Childcare.” We are taking a range of measures and have set specific targets and KPIs as defined below.
Canon is committed to providing equal opportunities according to ability and fair treatment for all, irrespective of gender.
In Japan, in addition to formulating action plans and disclosing information as mandated by the Act on the Promotion of Female Participation and Career Advancement in the Workplace, we are conducting our own original initiatives. For example, at Canon Inc., we organize leadership training for women as part of efforts to develop female candidates for managerial positions. Using the theme of developing a new business proposal, the training provides an opportunity to develop leadership qualities. Since its launch in 2012, a total of 244 women have completed the training and are playing active roles in their workplaces, including at overseas locations. Partly as a result of these measures, the number of female managers rose to 147 in 2022, compared with 58 in 2011.
Furthermore, we hold return-to-work seminars for employees returning from childcare leave and their supervisors, and provide mentoring by female managers. We also host lectures and interviews with female executives, and share the experiences of female managers to create opportunities for raising awareness around working with purpose and balancing work with life events.
Group companies in Japan are promoting a range of initiatives to support career development for women, including roundtable discussions between presidents and female employees and surveys to gauge awareness, as well as networking events with female leadership candidates inside and outside the company, career advancement training, and career training for women who have returned from childcare leave.
Outside Japan as well, to coincide with International Women’s Day, since 2020 Group companies in the Middle East and Africa have begun the SHE RISE Program, an in-house campaign to encourage the active participation of women. Canon U.S.A. is also running a project called Women in Leadership Levels (WiLL) to support the participation of women through a variety of opportunities, including networking events, lectures, and mentoring. In addition, Canon Europe formulated a set of diversity and inclusion commitments, and is monitoring and reviewing these in the regions it oversees. The commitments include activities to raise awareness of diversity and recruitment of diverse personnel.
Reflecting excellence in empowering women within the workplace, Eruboshi certification has been granted to Fukui Canon Materials (Grade 3), and to Canon Marketing Japan and Canon IT Solutions (Grade 2). The Eruboshi certification is granted by the Japanese Ministry of Health, Labour and Welfare based on satisfying certain evaluation criteria.
Canon is promoting initiatives to encourage men to participate in childcare, with the goal of realizing a society where men and women participate equally as parents.
At Canon Inc. and Group companies in Japan, we organize roundtable talks by, and publish interviews with men who have used childcare leave-related systems, and we hold seminars to introduce our childcare-related programs to male employees. These initiatives have proven effective: the childcare leave participation rate among men at Canon Inc. rose from 1.9% in 2011 to 47.7% in 2022.
The Canon Group Code of Conduct emphasizes respect for the individual and prohibits discrimination based on race, religion, nationality, gender, age, sexual orientation or gender identity. Our initiatives also cover sexual minorities, including lesbian, gay, bisexual, trans and queer (LGBTQ+) persons. With the goal of eliminating all forms of discrimination from the workplace, training for managers includes education on preventing discrimination. In addition, we make use of various opportunities to educate employees, such as departmental staff meetings and compliance meetings. The Barrier-free Mindsets training program, which we provide for employees of Canon Inc. and Canon Group companies in Japan, features content relating to sexual minorities and aims to deepen understanding of related issues. The Barrier-free Mindsets program is an online training module that aims to help employees understand the problems and hurt created by barriers within society, along with the many issues experienced by those with disabilities or members of sexual minorities, plus related points to consider. Around 83% of employees of Canon Inc. and Canon Group companies in Japan received this training between 2019 and 2022.
Another provision to promote a barrier-free environment is gender-neutral washrooms. We also provide counseling and consultation services with a specialist counselor.
Canon Inc. makes full use of the wealth of knowledge and skills of its veteran staff. In 1977, Canon Inc. was one of the first companies in Japan to set its retirement ageat 60. In 1982, we introduced a system for reemploying retired employees until the age of 63.
In 2000, we partially revised our system for re-employment after retirement and introduced a system of open recruitment internally for re-employment posts. Further, we raised the age limit for re-employment to 65 in 2007. As of the end of December 2022, there were 2,137 rehired employees in total.
Respecting the ideal of normalization*1 advocated by the United Nations, Canon proactively employs persons with disabilities at Canon Inc. and Canon Group companies in Japan.
The employment ratio at Canon Inc. for people with disabilities was 2.48% in 2022, exceeding the statutory minimum of 2.3%. Our recruitment processes also include workplace experience days and site tours to ensure all recruits can adapt quickly to life at work.
Moreover, we are doing our utmost to make workplaces more comfortable and accessible for people with disabilities by improving facilities, including providing greater barrier-free access. We are also working to expand the range and nature of jobs for people with disabilities.
Canon Wind*2 primarily hires people with intellectual disabilities and maintains a high employee retention rate.
Canon Inc. and Group companies in Japan have set up on-site hotlines after the 2016 amendment of the Promotion of Employment of Disabled Persons Law prohibiting discrimination and mandating reasonable consideration for people with disabilities. Canon’s measures to prevent discrimination against people with disabilities and ensure reasonable consideration at each site include providing individual consultations and personalized assistance or instruction during evacuation training drills and disaster preparedness training.
Since 2004, Canon Inc. and Canon Group companies in Japan have organized training courses and created e-learning modules to ensure workplaces are attentive to the needs of the hearing impaired. The training provides an accurate understanding of hearing impairments and introduces sign language to help promote smoother workflow. A total of 949 employeesparticipated in this training up to and including 2022.
Preventing the flow of people leaving their jobs to provide nursing care for family members has become an important social issue in Japan, which has a falling birthrate and an aging society. At Canon, we are taking steps to reduce the number of employees leaving work for nursing care by promoting activities to support them in balancing both priorities. Canon Inc. and Group companies in Japan hold nursing care seminars, conduct interviews with employees engaged in nursing care, and offer information on steps to take when a relative begins to need care and on nursing care-related systems, both public and internal.
Since 2020, we have been holding online nursing care seminars in cooperation with local authorities.
