Stories

Choosing for Oneself and to be Chosen: Transforming the Assignment Process for New Graduate Employees through Job Matching

- Aiming to Become a Company Where Employees Build Autonomous Careers and Grow Together -

At Sysmex, human resources are among one of our key management resources that support sustainable growth, and we regard human capital as the source of corporate value creation. In addition, Sysmex is committed to improving employee engagement, based on its corporate philosophy of “Shared Values,” which states that we provide an environment where all people working at Sysmex can feel secure in demonstrating their abilities and opportunities for self-realization and growth. 
 
Sysmex believes that career autonomy, in which employees take initiative to design their own career path rather than leaving it up to the company, is essential to improve employee engagement, and that employees must have the opportunity to choose their own careers. From 2021, we introduced a new system that uses a proprietary algorithm developed in collaboration with the University of Tokyo Market Design Center (UTMD). The system is designed to determine the optimal “match” (plan for assignment) for which department the new graduate should be assigned based on the requirements of new graduates and departments that are candidates for the new employees’ assignment, with minimal intervention from the human resources department.  
 
This article introduces Sysmex’s job matching system, with comments from Arisa Matsui of the Human Resources Development Department, who promotes this initiative at Sysmex, and Naoki Ishihara, a mentor in the Theta Project, which consists of volunteer employees who support this initiative. 
 
左:Thetaプロジェクトメンター 石原 直樹、右:人材開発部 松井 有沙

Left: Theta Project Mentor, Naoki Ishihara Right: Human Resources Development Department, Arisa Matsui

Utilizing Matching Theory for Personnel Assignments to Promote Autonomous Career Development and Engagement

For many years, Sysmex has managed its human resources through the so-called Japanese-style (membership-based) personnel system, in which the company decides an employee’s assignment and appointment. However, with the rapid globalization and portfolio expansion of our business, the ratio of mid-career hires and non-Japanese employees has increased year by year. In order to sustain our high growth potential, we urgently needed to acquire and train highly specialized personnel and next-generation leaders, as well as appropriately assign and train diverse human resources and create an attractive environment for them to succeed in. 
 
In 2020, we introduced a new job-based personnel system as one of the foundations to enable each employee to develop their expertise and design their autonomous career path. This new system revolutionized the former ability-based personnel system that employees’ grades are ranked based on their ability, by determining an employee’s grade based on their role and job content. 
 
In a survey on employee engagement carried out before the job-based personnel system was introduced, we found that engagement was high in the first year of employment after the graduate but declined in the second and third year. The survey found a mismatch between employees’ expertise and the job they wanted to do, versus the job they were actually assigned to, which made them unable to envision their own future career path. 
 
The human resources department wanted to improve the situation by creating a system that would make employees realize they could choose their own career path. With the support of UTMD, we embarked on a joint research project to develop a “matching algorithm,” which is a method to determine job assignments to promote autonomous career development and introduced the system for new graduate employee assignments.  
How the Matching Algorithm Works
How the Matching Algorithm Works

 


 

Ishihara: During my previous position at Google’s Silicon Valley headquarters, I became acquainted with Professor Kojima, Director of the UTMD Center, who was a professor at Stanford University at the time. Just when I joined Sysmex, Dr. Kojima also returned to the University of Tokyo, and we talked about doing something interesting together which led to our joint research.


Employees and Departments Show Each Other’s Appealing Points which Encourages Employees’ Autonomous Growth

To introduce the matching algorithm, we first reviewed Sysmex’s recruitment flow for new graduates. Instead of dividing jobs into the two main categories: general career track positions with opportunities to assume managerial responsibilities versus operational positions limited to clerical duties we established contact points for each job type from the time of recruitment. In addition, during the initial training period after the employee enters the company, each department that is a candidate for the new employee’s assignment will give a presentation to introduce its department’s mission and job content. Next, the new graduate gives a presentation to showcase itself. After both sides complete their presentations, the new graduate ranks its preferred departments, along with each department also ranking the new graduates in its order of preference. This information is then entered into a matching algorithm to determine the department the new graduate will be assigned to.

Sysmex’s Process from Recruitment to Job Assignment
Sysmex’s Process from Recruitment to Job Assignment


 
Matsui: Even if new graduates are not good at making presentations, many try their best to convey their personality and passion for work. There is also a sense of tension that the presentation will determine the first step in their career. As for the departments, this system also enables them to convey specific projects and job content they were not able to before the new graduates joined the company, so new graduates can actually choose the department with a more concrete image of their work.

In the first year the new decision process for job assignment was implemented (FY2021), the ratio of satisfaction among new graduates was 95%, and 71% for engagement score, up nearly five points compared to the previous year.  

In addition, the ratio of new graduates who had no intention of transferring to another department also increased from 64.4% to 85.7% compared to the previous year. 

We believe increased satisfaction in their job assignment is a result of the decision process becoming transparent, and that decisions are now made based on a system which enables new graduates and departments to decide where they will be assigned based on their wishes. 

Meanwhile, the satisfaction rate of the departments accepting new graduates remained at around 70% in the first year, with some departments feeling disappointed over the limited number of new graduates expressing a desire to work with them. However, from the next year onward, departments started making an effort to convey their own allure. They began seeking ways to appeal their department enough to be chosen by new graduates, emphasizing the fulfillment in their work, the type of work new graduates will experience, and the skills they will acquire in the future. The new graduates also began to actively engage in the process, asking a series of specific questions after the departments’ presentations, imagining what it would be like to work there.

This has increased both parties’ satisfaction with assignments, and in FY2022, the three-year turnover rate for new graduates was 0%, while the company’s overall turnover rate was 2.7%. So, we were able to achieve our target of less than 3.0%. In follow-up interviews with new employees, we have seen firsthand how they are much more motivated to work than in the past.




Ishihara: Recently, I heard department heads saying they are now getting people with “passion.” I believe this passion is very important. It is said that a person’s performance can change by four-to-five times depending on the difference in passion. We will be conducting quantitative measurements in the future, but I was really happy to hear the word “passion” coming from the department.



Matsui: I believe that “self-choice” is significant as it is a process of taking responsibility for one’s own career and making decisions independently. In order to realize career autonomy, it is important to provide a mechanism for each employee to experience this. Also, job matching does not necessarily mean that one’s wishes will always be fulfilled. However, the experience of working on a presentation to the best of one’s ability and being assigned to a department that has chosen them, can bring a sense of satisfaction and serve as a stepping stone in their future career.

Opening Opportunities and Giving More Employees the Experience to Design Their Own Career

Matching algorithms do not solve all career development and engagement challenges. In fact, even if you are assigned to the department of your first choice, after some time you may find it does not match your values and strengths. In such cases, we have a system in place in which open positions are made available to the entire company so that employees can apply for them. There have been cases where employees changed their job title from sales to planning, or from development to human resources, or some employees in their 40s have even taken on the challenge of overseas-related work which they had long hoped for. We believe this system gives a wide range of employees, not limited to young people, an opportunity to develop their careers.
 

 


Matsui: When the new personnel system started, many employees were puzzled by the different approach compared to the past. However, I feel that as the experience of “creating one’s own career” accumulated within the organization, the goals that the company aims to achieve are gradually being shared among the employees. I would like to further enrich the experience of each employee working at Sysmex not only through job matching but also through a variety of other personnel measures.


Ishihara: We believe the job-specific recruitment and job matching have had a significant impact on Sysmex. There is a sense of accomplishment with some noticeable ripple effects. In the future, I would like to analyze the effects more precisely and apply the knowledge of economics, such as matching, to even larger themes. My dream is not limited to Sysmex as I hope to improve society as a whole.

 

Sysmex actively supports the autonomous career development of each and every employee. The ability to build a career of one’s choice in accordance with one’s life stage and career values leads to employees being able to work with happiness. Sysmex believes this will result in high productivity and added value and will help realize becoming a company that continues to grow. 
 
To realize our long-term vision, “Together for a better healthcare journey,” Sysmex will continue to promote aiming to become an organization where diverse human resources can feel comfortable exercising their abilities and creating innovation.  
 
 
  • Information contained in the stories is current as of the date of the announcement,
    but may be subject to change without prior notice.

Back to "Stories"