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A place to enhance mutual understanding between employees and the company. The 2nd ASNOVA General Employee Meeting was held.
The second general meeting of employees was held on Saturday, May 25, 2024 at the Nagoya Convention Hall.
This time, we also held an in-house reading group called "MOKKEI," making it an even more exciting day than last year.
For ASNOVA, the "General Employee Meeting" and "MOKKEI" are essential initiatives for fostering a corporate culture. We spoke to Mr. Shunsuke Takeuchi, General Affairs Department Senior Manager who is responsible for running the General Employee Meeting, and Mr. Ryo Fujiwara, Human Resources Department Senior Manager in charge of "MOKKEI," about their respective goals and thoughts.
Text: Sayaka Mitsuda
Photo: Sho Kobayashi
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- Shunsuke Takeuchi
- Senior Manager, General Affairs Department at ASNOVA Inc. He joined ASNOVA Inc. in 2019 and, as general affairs department senior manager, is involved in a wide range of tasks, including managing internal regulations, legal affairs, and IT infrastructure.
- Ryo Fujiwara
- Senior Manager the Human Resources Department at ASNOVA Inc. He joined ASNOVA Inc. in 2018, served as Tokyo Sales Office, and has held his current position since 2023. As senior manager of the Human Resources Department, he is involved in organizational strategy and human resources strategy work.
Reflecting the opinions from the previous meeting to make the general meeting more satisfying for more employees
Q. What changes were made to this year's general meeting compared to the last one?
Takeuchi: First, the biggest changes were to the food, seating, and content. Last time, we prepared catering and let everyone help themselves to food, but we received a lot of feedback, such as "I couldn't eat properly because the queue was too long" and "I wanted to talk to people I met for the first time, but I couldn't because I was waiting in line."
So this time we decided to prepare two types of bento. We chose bento with a focus on volume, but with a longer expiration date so that people could take it home if they couldn't eat it, and we also prepared paper bags for take-away. We also wanted something that was typical of Nagoya for people coming from all over the country, so we chose "tenmusu," a Nagoya specialty. In a survey conducted after the second event, we received feedback such as "We were able to eat while interacting with other employees" and "The portions were plentiful and delicious," and although there are some things we would like to reflect on, we feel that we were able to resolve the dissatisfaction from the previous event.
In addition, during the meal, we had the opportunity to introduce employees, and General Affairs Department created a video that showed each employee's hobbies and private life. We hoped that this would provide a topic of conversation during the meal, as well as a way for employees to get to know each other better.
Regarding "seating," last time, people were asked to draw lots after arriving and seats were decided randomly, but there were many comments saying, "I felt lonely because I didn't know anyone," so this time, we decided that out of the eight people at each table, six would be Equipment Center employees from the same area, and we calculated and set the seats so that two employees such as executives, sales staff, and back office members would also be included. At that time, we asked all employees to draw the lottery online in advance. This was because we aimed to ensure that people who participated in this would be able to take a seat immediately when they arrived, and to make guidance smoother.
Unlike the previous meeting, the "contents" section was solicited from each department regarding what they wanted to announce. This was because we wanted employees to use the general employee meeting as a place to communicate what they wanted to know, rather than the company informing them unilaterally.
Of course, it wasn't just me; General Affairs Department members, including Section Assistant Manager Kuchida, Supervisor Yamamoto, and Tanaka, all worked together to look over each and every opinion from the last survey and hold meetings to consider how we could improve things. As a result, I think we were able to convert the opinions of our employees into many ideas, such as using two monitors for presentations and shining spotlights so that the presenters' faces could be seen. I'm grateful to everyone who responded to the last survey for this.
Q. What role does the general meeting of employees play for ASNOVA?
Takeuchi: We believe that ASNOVA's general employee meeting is not just a place to announce the company's business plan and purpose, but also plays an important role as a place for employees to communicate with each other. We hope that everyone will enjoy participating as it is a valuable opportunity for employees with different positions and positions to interact directly.
We also want all employees to think of the General Employee Meeting as a place where they can actively create it. General Affairs Department is in a position to fairly handle employees' "I want to do it" and "I want it to be like this" voices and realize a form that satisfies everyone as much as possible. We are the ones who create 1 from 0, and it is up to all employees to turn that 1 into 10. In the future, we would like to hold the General Employee Meeting as an executive committee rather than just General Affairs Department, and have employees who are interested in running it run for office. We hope to continue this as a place to deepen communication between employees and as a place for individual growth and challenges in the coming years.
Improving employees' human potential through "MOKKEI" leads to company growth
Q. In the second part of the general meeting, an in-house reading group called "MOKKEI" was held. It seems that you tried something different this time. What was it like?
Fujiwara: At ASNOVA, we have an initiative called "MOKKEI" where employees read the monthly magazine "Chichi" once a month and give feedback on their impressions. The goal is to improve each employee's human potential by respecting individual opinions and gaining awareness and learning from the opinions of others.
This time, we increased the number of participants from the usual 40 to 60. The increased number of participants was targeted at managers from each equipment center. until now, MOKKEI has been centered on management, employees working at the head office, and members of sales department, so we were concerned that it might be difficult to expand to employees working at equipment center. For that reason, we wanted to use this general employee meeting to bring together the managers from each equipment center, so that the employees working at equipment center could feel closer to the MOKKEI initiative.
We also divided the participants into groups so that each group would have at least one first-time participant, and we mixed job titles and occupations so that people who do not normally interact with each other could exchange opinions on an equal footing.
Q. Did you notice anything about the people participating for the first time?
Fujiwara: It was impressive how everyone was working very seriously. I feel that each person wrote their own impressions. We live in a convenient age where you can find out anything you want by looking it up, but that is why we at MOKKEI want to value learning from great people and history of the past and drawing them into our own lives.
In addition, the opinions of older people can be a learning experience for younger employees and center manager, and conversely, older people can learn things like, "Oh, so that's what the younger employees think." In the surveys after participating, we received comments such as, "It was fun to hear the opinions of so many different people," and "Even when reading the same article, I realized that I had different realizations, which was educational," and we realized that this reading group is extremely valuable as an opportunity to promote mutual understanding and learning.
Q. What kind of role will "MOKKEI" play for ASNOVA in the future?
Fujiwara: "MOKKEI" is an important initiative that not only develops human skills, but also leads to the growth of the company. By continuing to participate, the more you do it, the more you can hone your human skills. From next time onwards, in addition to center manager who participated this time, we plan to hold the event online for the first time, including members from Vietnam. I think that it is inevitably difficult to reproduce the atmosphere of a real place online, but our goal is to eventually have all employees participate in "MOKKEI", so we would like to take on the challenge to make it a reality.
Through "MOKKEI," we can cultivate the ability to focus on the good points (consciously focusing on the strengths and characteristics of others, rather than on their shortcomings and flaws) and to approach things with an open heart. We hope that this will be an opportunity to enrich not only the work at ASNOVA, but also the future lives of each employee.
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