In Japan, where the population is aging quickly and the birthrate is low, an urgent issue is to solve the shortage of labor by allowing diverse work styles. 

However, discussions about what employment practices should look like and what skills will be in demand in the future are happening not only in Japan, but around the world in anticipation of changes in the structure of industry and employment.

A report released by the World Economic Forum in 2018 said a “robot revolution” is expected to create 133 million new jobs by 2022, while 75 million existing jobs could be displaced. 

The report from the forum ― known for its annual meeting held in Davos, Switzerland ― painted a positive picture of a future brought on by the Fourth Industrial Revolution where technologies such as the “internet of things” and AI develop. However, at the same time, it pointed out that it takes a labor force equipped with new skills to harness growth opportunities.

The report stressed the need for an education system that supports individuals in improving or relearning skills and social policies aimed at promoting lifelong learning.

Individuals in focus

Needless to say, the Japanese government already has comprehensive talent and employment policies aimed at helping develop creativity and the country’s strengths by capitalizing on information technology.

For instance, there is a policy to promote the learning of IT skills based on an employee’s knowledge and in each industry area or such skills required in a cross-sectoral manner. Another example is a measure to support education for equipping individuals with basic IT literacy in cooperation with universities and other institutions. Moreover, the government places an emphasis on policies to stimulate motivation and enthusiasm in workers that leads to helping improve productivity or create new types of value for the company.

The government also seeks to promote clarification of duties for employees and their improved treatment based on fair performance evaluation. It even accepts having a side business and freelancing as work style options, because it attaches importance to the power of individuals as the source of value creation.

Kouki Noumura, director of the Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry’s Human Resources Policy Office, said the ministry’s policy on workforce and employment practices going forward is to encourage flexible work styles.

“In the coming era where there would be rapid progress stemmed from the Fourth Industrial Revolution and population aging, what organizations need is the ability to adapt to a changing environment,” Noumura said. “And for that, you need to create an environment where individuals can maximize their sense of value. We in the government are promoting flexible work styles so that each individual can find a work style that best suits them and can maximize their skills.”

Some companies have strived to fundamentally improve the social environment surrounding nursing care by storing scientific data and empirical values, which are difficult to visualize, in artificial intelligence.

ExaWizards Inc., a startup founded in 2016, has been working on reforming nursing care sites, including those with patients suffering from dementia.

ExaWizards President and CEO Ko Ishiyama served as the first head of the Recruit Institute of Technology and later joined a university-originated venture company in 2017, founded by Yoichi Takebayashi, a specially appointed professor at Shizuoka University, and others. Takebayashi is a leading expert in data analysis for dementia. The venture firm merged with AI venture ExaIntelligence, originating from Kyoto University, leading to the launch of ExaWizards.

One of many projects that ExaWizards has concurrently promoted is the effort to disseminate a caregiving method known as Humanitude, which was developed in France more than 40 years ago. The company has also been working to analyze the effects of this method and spread the proper way of its caregiving.

One example from this project is to help nurture personnel in the nursing care field by utilizing the company’s original video coaching app and AI.

“For example, in order to communicate with people suffering from dementia, you need to talk to them from a distance of about 20 centimeters while sustaining eye contact,” Ishiyama said. “If you talk to them from their side or touch their body without proper knowledge of how to contact them, they might be surprised and it could prompt an adverse reaction.”

ExaWizards is now developing a service that enables caregivers to send a video capturing their actual caregiving approach; then the company’s AI would measure the distance of their contact with a patient. The video would be sent back to the caregivers, featuring written advice in red pen and comments from caregiving experts. An example of such a comment could be, “It’s better for you to have your face in front of the patient so that you can easily maintain eye contact.”

If this service becomes widely used, it would surely provide an opportunity for caregivers to reflect on their approach. Additionally, it could contribute to the improvement of the quality of overall care provided by a facility.

“Acquiring proper caregiving methods could reduce the chances of adverse reactions from patients, which would eventually alleviate the burden on caregivers themselves,” Ishiyama noted.

From March, ExaWizards also began providing a service to analyze nursing care data possessed by municipal governments. Assessing intervention effects in dementia care has been difficult because symptoms advance as time goes by. But if the introduction of AI were to help predict transitions of nursing care levels, it could visualize intervention effects. It could enable municipalities to have clearer prospects for their future fiscal conditions and properly implement projects for prevention.