2017 Vol.4

Employee Relocation Systems from the Standpoint of Diversity Management: Issues and Future Directions

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Companies are coming to a crossroads in terms of employee relocation systems. During Japan’s highgrowth era, three important systems—lifetime employment, seniority-based salaries, and companybased unions—were established, and Japanese companies have utilized employee relocation, along with these three systems, as a means to make personnel adjustments in response to growth. Subsequently, companies began using employee relocation for personnel training and screening of management candidates. Companies today have employee relocation policies that have multiple purposes. Lately, however, companies facing pressure to reexamine their employee relocation policies. It goes without saying that relocation has a significant impact on both employees’ work and their personal life. Although issues involving compatibility with employees’ life plans and financial problems resulting from solo relocation (i.e., relocation with no accompanying family members) have long been pointed out, new issues have recently emerged involving diversity management. This paper considers how employee relocation has been conducted in the past and discusses the role of employee relocation systems and their impact on broader personnel systems. It then clarifies typical issues concerning employee relocation and issues newly arising from the standpoint of diversity management, summarizes measures to solve them, and proposes employee relocation policies that companies should adopt in the future.