Business Practices Japanese Feaatures Society and Customs

Weird Corporate Practices in Japan Part 2

Continued from the previous post...

Photo by Pixabay used under CC

Following the heated fuss,  Rengo, Japanese Trade Union Confederation, has launched an official investigation on this matter.  They have found out some statistics.

Of 1000 company employees, male and female, participated in the research, about 57 percent answered their companies have some kind of dress codes, such as clothes and appearance.  The hotel and food industry (86.7 percent) and the finance and insurance (71.4 percent) ranked high and showed strong concerns about employees' dress codes.

More interestingly, there are some companies reported they have different standards given to male and female employees.  For example, 8.6 percent reported that women MUST wear make-up at the workplace.  Some even make a strict rule about the height of female shoes.  Still more interesting, over 36 percent of those employees are reported to say "they cannot do anything about it."

#KuToo movement against the heels:

Among those contacted by Rengo, about 11 percent answered that there is a rule of the height of female shoes at the workplace.  This report is also pretty shocking because "#KuToo" movement has already been gaining attention and giving pressure on ill-practiced companies to ban such a discriminatory rule.

As you may know, the "MeToo" movement posed serious accusations against sexual harassment and abuse and shook American society.  Starting from entertaining business, female workers confessed and shared their experiences in business community.  In Japan, the similar movement, "KuToo" movement was triggered by one tweet.

This "KuToo" movement originally started opposing rules of women's heels whose height is regulated by companies.  Kutoo has a double meaning of  Kutu (English: shoes) and Kutsu (English: pain).  Naming the movement "KuToo" is actually really witty. 

Insurance companies regulate how high female heels should be.  Wearing low heels and flat shoes, female employees are reprimanded by their seniors.  Of course, this means they are banned from wearing other types of shoes than heels.  Hotel and airline industries are more strict: the heels should be as high as 3 to 5 centimeters.

Can you imagine working and walking around in such high heels whole day?  (As a side note, no wonder a lot of goods are marketed to alleviate leg/foot pains of female workers in Japan).

To wear sneakers, those female employees have to submit an official document and get approved.  Even they do not like these rules and want to wear whatever they feel comfortable in, they rarely voice their opinions.  They seem so afraid of being judged as "difficult" workers by their co-workers and seniors.  Unfortunately, Japanese companies still seem to follow "group-oriented" societal norms: Don't rock the boat even to change bad customs. 

When do you think female workers will fulfill their potentials to the highest without worrying about how they look? 

What do you think?  Do these practice, or the rules, applied differently for company's employees sound a little weird in such an "advanced" or seemingly liberal society as Japan?