Recruitment, Development and
Success of Human Resources
Basic Concept
Talent is an essential management capital for achieving sustainable business growth and creating new value. Our ability to achieve high growth while creating new markets owes to the successes of our talented human resources. Through this approach, we have identified “promote recruitment, development, and success of human resources” as key material issues. While actively recruiting diverse, highly specialized talent that contributes to business growth, we emphasize mission-driven individuals who resonate with our mission and vision. Even as we rapidly expand our workforce, we ensure to prevent the dilution of our corporate culture that we have embraced as a foundation of our human capital. In doing so, we foster a corporate culture that encourages our people to continue to take on challenges toward our common mission and goal. Furthermore, we focus on creating an environment that supports employee growth by developing training programs and career support systems to help each and every employee utilize their knowledge and ideas to their full potential. Under these policies, we drive the creation of opportunities and the development of an environment for diverse talent to succeed, thereby promoting innovation to help solve business challenges.Human Recources Structure
Four departments collaborate to drive initiatives that contribute to business growth, centered on the CHRO Team , which plans and formulates company-wide human resources strategies, builds data infrastructure, and designs systems. The Recruitment Management Department is responsible for designing and operating company-wide recruitment policies and processes, while the HRBP(Human Resource Business Partner) Management Team is assigned to each division to execute initiatives aligned with the business strategy. The Culture & People Department fosters an environment in which employees can proactively develop their careers. Beyond supporting skill and career development, this drives the growth of individuals and the organization by heightening engagement, cultivating organizational culture, and promoting diversity and well-being.Major Initiatives
Recruitment of Richly Diverse, Outstanding Talent
Continuous strengthening of recruitment is an essential element of our growth strategy. Our various organizations, including development, sales, and back office, comprise talented individuals from diverse backgrounds. We emphasize hiring employees with strong expertise and skills, and who have a mission-driven attitude that matches our corporate philosophy. This emphasis stems from our belief that people whose ideals match our corporate philosophy, such as our mission, vision, and values, are more likely to be successful after joining. This mission-driven corporate culture has been an effective tool for recruiting, enabling us to hire a range of highly capable individuals. We are also focused on strengthening referral hiring, aiming for a recruitment rate of 35% through referrals by FY2029. The hiring success rate through referrals is significantly greater than that from standard procedures, greatly contributing to our important growth strategy of talent acquisition. As employees approach people they want to work with, referral hiring tends to result in fewer mismatches with the company after hiring and lower early resignation rates than standard hires. Furthermore, referral hiring reflects that employees hold our group in high regard, motivating them to recommend it to close friends and acquaintances as a good place to work. Therefore, we place importance on the percentage of recruitment through referrals as an indicator to quantitatively measure organizational health.Measures to Strengthen Referral Hiring
My Myaku—An employee referral-based hiring system
We have created an environment that encourages employees to make referrals by covering meal costs when making referrals and reward payments when referrals are hired.
Utilization of digital signage and video content
We raise awareness of the My Myaku program by using digital signage on each floor of our office and internal videos to encourage employees to actively participate in referral hiring.
Sansan Bar—Events for interactions between employees and potential candidates
We host a monthly event called Sansan Bar, where employees and potential candidates can interact. Each time, 50+ participants join the event, strengthening the system for introducing and recruiting through employees’ networks.
Our Recruitment System That Supports Organizational Expansion
To drive further business growth, we have adopted a division structure with independent sales organizations for each service. By assigning a Human Resource Business Partner (HRBP) to each division, we implement a flexible human resource strategy tailored to the specific characteristics of each business, enabling optimal recruitment for each division.Measures to Strengthen Our Recruitment System
Establishment of Human Resource Business Partner (HRBP) organization
To promote large-scale recruitment, we established an HRBP organization within each division to strengthen our on-the-ground recruitment abilities. HRBP gain a deep understanding of each division’s unique needs based on its strategy, collaborating with the Human Resources Division to implement optimal recruitment plans, training, evaluations, and more.Integration and optimization of our recruitment operations
To enhance efficiency in our recruitment operations, we established a cross-department operational planning team within the Human Resources Division. This team integrates our overall recruitment operations, achieving both optimization for each department and improved efficiency simultaneously.
Building of a recruitment brand and information dissemination
We strive to build a recruitment brand common for all positions and divisions while strengthening our information dissemination to enhance recruitment efforts. Our goal is to attract outstanding talent and improve the effectiveness of our recruitment activities.
Promoting Human Resources Development and Success
Amid rapid organizational growth, we believe that accelerating personal growth is the most important measure for maintaining and improving productivity without compromising it.HR and Evaluation Systems
Adoption of Mission Grade System
We have adopted a Mission Grade System for personnel evaluation, which determines the level of job authority, responsibility, and treatment according to different grades. These grades are determined based on performance and future expectations, leveraging growth for each individual.
Objectives and Key Results (OKRs) and 360-degree evaluation system
For HR evaluations, we assess individual contributions to the organization based on Objectives and Key Results (OKRs), which are set quarterly in the organization. In addition, we adopt a 360-degree evaluation to comprehensively incorporate feedback not only from direct supervisors but also from colleagues the employee works with and relevant personnel in other departments. These measures promote employee growth and strengthen overall organizational performance.
Top Gun Development Program for New Graduates
Top Gun is a results-focused training program for new graduates in general positions. In this program, new graduates tackle actual business challenges, enabling them to unlock their full potential early on. After completing the basic onboarding training, they are divided into groups to accomplish missions based on real business challenges. They take on the entire process—from developing strategies to achieve their goals, to securing appointments, conducting negotiations, closing deals, and supporting customers. In this program, high-performing employees from the field act as managers to support new graduates, helping them deepen their understanding of business processes and our corporate culture. Our goal is for new graduates to gain successful experiences early through the practical challenges, allowing them to grow with confidence.
Generative AI Usage Program
We announced “AI-first” as a company-wide policy in January 2025, making generative AI central to our operations. Based on this policy, we have begun strengthening our internal support systems with the aim of establishing an AI utilization framework for all employees and improving their AI literacy. We are driving specific initiatives such as implementing an onboarding program for all employees to use generative AI, sharing internal examples of its use in operations, and supporting its use in each department. Our goal is to ensure the widespread adoption of AI in operations across all job categories and to improve operational efficiency. As a result of this initiative, an internal survey conducted in April 2025 revealed that the internal rate of using generative AI in work operations reached 99%, with 82% reporting that they use it “almost daily.” Furthermore, 98% said “the quality of their work improved,” and 71% reported they experienced “a time savings of 30 minutes or more per day.” These results demonstrate significant operational effectiveness achieved in a short period.To promote these initiatives, we invested ¥72 million in establishing a company-wide generative AI usage environment during FY2024 and total company-wide training hours related to generative AI reached approximately 58,900 hours during the same period.
Improving Employee Engagement
We have consistently conducted employee engagement surveys over the past four years, and we view engagement scores as a key metric strongly correlated with business performance. Our eNPSSM,*1 which measures whether employees would recommend their company to others, remains at a high level, with -5.4% in FY2024, following -0.6% in FY2023, while the average for Japanese companies is said to be between -40% and -50%. To improve engagement, we implement the following initiatives, focusing on three dimensionss. Going forward, we will contribute to improving overall organizational performance and business growth.- *1 eNPSSM stands for Employee Net Promoter Score. It is a service mark of Bain & Company, Inc., Fred Reichheld, and Satmetrix Systems, Inc. The eNPS is obtained by subtracting the percentage of Detractors from the percentage of Promoters of working for the Company.
(For individuals)
Jump! (internal recruiting system)
This system enables employees to move to other positions, allowing them to take on new challenges, gain business experience, and grow.
OYACO
We create a supportive environment that helps employees balance childcare and work through a system designated to assist them in managing both.
Coacher & Career Talk
Through our internal one-on-one coaching program “Coacher” led by employees with specialized qualifications and “Career Talk,” an interviewing program which professionally addresses career issues, we are enhancing employee autonomy, fostering a tangible sense of growth, and supporting mid-to-long-term career development.
Career Directory
This is an internal portal that highlights a wide range of career paths of employees who are active across our Group. In addition, the featured employees serve as career peer mentors, offering opportunities for dialogue that help others gain new perspectives, discover new options, and foster proactive career development.
Subsidy system for the cost of low-dose contraceptives via online consultations
We subsidize the cost of low-dose contraceptives and the online consultations required for prescriptions.
Engagement surveys
Once a month, we conduct engagement surveys for regular employees and contract employees. The results from analyses of the responses are used for self-management, organizational management, and the planning of company-wide internal systems and measures.
(For surroundings)
Strength Matching
Employees share their strengths and behavioral characteristics based on career summaries and personality assessments. Each employee’s strengths are visualized and shared on the talent management system, contributing to stimulating cross-departmental communication and improving our management precision.Mitsukacchi (Peer Bonus® using Unipos)
We enhance overall organizational motivation and promote the spread of our internal culture by utilizing a system where employees praise each other.Yoriai
This system supports social events to promote communication among employees.
Coacher Team
This system helps teams achieve their goals and promotes collaboration among members through group coaching.
Sansan Value Star (employee recognition awards)
This system recognizes employees who have embodied values and achieved results with awards.
(Organizational aspects)
Office-centric
We practice an office-centric work style that emphasizes face-to-face communication, combined with remote work, for the purpose of maximizing employees’ productivity and creativity.
My Myaku recruitment (referral hiring)
We recruit excellent talent who align with our corporate culture by utilizing employees’ networks.
Culture-focused recruitment
Our focus is on hiring personnel who resonate with our mission and vision and can embody them.
“Katachi” Discussions
We hold opportunities for all employees to participate in sharing and discussing our corporate philosophy to help spread it across the organization.
Long-term internships
We offer a long-term internship program to develop future leaders.
Fostering IT Talent for the Future
We support the Kamiyama Marugoto College of Design, Technology, and Entrepreneurship, a private technical college that opened in 2023. The school aims to nurture people who create things and possess the ability to make things happen that is, people who can change society. By supporting this institution in creating future innovators, we aim to fulfill our mission of “Turning encounters into innovation” and to help develop IT human resources who will transform the world. Specifically, we participate as a scholarship partner*2 and support multiple students as Sansan Scholars. Young employees from our group, including sales and business planning staff, designers, engineers, and other diverse roles, participate as mentors, offering year-round support programs to the students. The content of these programs varies by school year. We decide activity policies based on assignments set by the school and provide support. The College now has students up to the second year. First-year students are given the task of presenting on a company’s appeal and second year students devise future businesses that leverage a company’s strengths. Mentors share their respective knowledge and experience in presentation and design and in the structure and necessary functions of companies, how services are developed, and other aspects. The support initiatives simultaneously promote the growth of the employees who participate as mentors, and contribute to developing the group’s human resources, such as in the expectation they will become candidates for management positions.
- *2 Companies that have made contributions or donations to scholarship funds for the purpose of making tuition virtually free.
Fostering Corporate Culture as the Foundation of Human Capital
The group values having a mission-driven culture. We collectively refer to our mission, vision, and values as the “Katachi of Sansan.” Each year, we set a theme that addresses short-term focus areas. The theme for 2024 is “growth mindset.” As our organization continues to expand, each individual’s growth becomes a driver of business growth, directly contributing to the company’s overall growth. By combining each person’s growth mindset with our corporate philosophy, including our mission, we cultivate a culture that serves as the foundation of our group’s human capital. To that end, we are enhancing our various training programs to ensure that each employee, starting from their entry into the company and through various opportunities, engages with the company culture and the annual themes.SCOP (Sansan Culture Onboarding Program)
Our organization continues to expand, and about half of our current employees have joined within the past three years. To ensure that employees from various backgrounds can quickly succeed, it is important to align their careers and personal growth with our group’s mission, vision, values, and corporate philosophy as soon as possible. To achieve this, we use two of the five days of our SCOP onboarding program, which starts on the employees’ first day to deepen their understanding of our corporate philosophy and values. Even after being assigned to a position, for six months after joining the company, we provide monthly opportunities as part of SCOP to engage in discussions with managers from employees’ own departments and other departments, as well as with executives, about our mission, vision, and values, aiming to help employees learn more deeply through experience.- 5-Day Program
- Learn about our group’s knowledge.
- Katachi Training (CEO), Katachi Salon (directors), Katachi Salon (executive officers)
- Hear directly from the CEO, directors, and executive officers about their thoughts on the “Katachi of Sansan.”
- Katachiba (group managers)
- Together with group managers, employees articulate their thoughts on the “Katachi of Sansan” in relation to their own work.
- Katachi Offsite Meeting
- Based on the training thus far, employees deepen their understanding by discussing the “Katachi of Sansan” in their own words.