Top 10 companies with the happiest employees in Japan. RANKED!

10. Itochu

Itochu covers a broad range of operations, textiles, machinery, energy & chemicals, and more. Year after year, the category consistently rated the highest for them was salary satisfaction! They have a page for students included on their recruiting page.

9. The Prudential Life Insurance Company Ltd.

As their name says, Prudential is a company that provides life insurance. Their parent company, Prudential Financial, is an American fortune 500 company and one of the world’s largest financial institutions. Their HR department was ranked 4.9 stars out of 5.

8. Cisco Systems 

Another American company, their business is all about tech. Networks, firewalls, e-mail security, cloud services, and a whole lot more. Their fully localized website makes it obvious they’re conscious about globalization, and salary satisfaction was also one of their highest ranked features.

7. Suntory

Suntory is a Japanese brewing and distilling company, and one of the oldest alcohol distribution companies in Japan, established in 1899. They received high marks in salary satisfaction, employee respect, and employee motivation. 

6. Uzabase

Uzabase features two business information services, and they have openings in Japan for foreign professionals on their website! Their ratings have been pretty consistently high since they joined the ranking in 2012.

5. Link and Motivation Group

Link and Motivation Group is a management consulting firm that “revitalizes organizations and individuals.” They had near perfect scores for employee motivation, opportunities for young employees, and mutual respect among workers. However, their salary satisfaction was significantly lower than some of the other companies on the list thus far. 

4. The Boston Consulting Group 

This is an American company with offices in more than 50 countries. Like Link and Motivation Group, they’re another management consulting firm. Their scores were pretty well rounded all across the board, with their best ranking being in opportunities for young employees. 

3. Mitsui Fudosan Co., Ltd.

Mitsui Fudosan is a Japanese real estate company. Their scores were also pretty well rounded to create an average of 4.5. However, most of their scores seem to have either flat lined in recent years or started a slow decline, the exception being the amount of paid vacation time, which shot up in 2019.

2. Salesforce.com 

Another American company for the list, Salesforce.com is a cloud-based software company that offers services for customer relationship management. They’ve been on the top 10 list for a couple years now, holding the number 1 spot in 2018 and number 2 in 2017. 

1. Google

Here is a company that needs no introduction! Google has been on the list a long while, it’s been in the top 5 since 2014 ( though it fell off in 2018). Their highest score is in salary satisfaction, and their lowest is in long-term employee growth.

Looking at this list and its criteria, it’s not hard to see why these companies made it to the top when placing it against the research data for what Japanese college students want out of companies. Surveys from 2001 to 2019 suggest that now students primarily look for “stability,” and “good salary.” “Feeling like the work you do is valuable,” and “good workplace environment” have been on a decline over the last few years.

If you’re looking for a job in Japan, check out this list and see if any of these great companies might be a good fit for you. You can also check job listings on IZANAU.