Health Management for Becoming a 100-Year Enterprise

Guided by our Vision 2050 - Creating Our Future Together, we endeavor to build a bright, exciting future together with our employees. The mental and physical health of our employees indisputably lays the foundation for everything that we do. Using health management as a driving force, AUTOBACS SEVEN will aim for the realization of its vision and fulfill the AUTOBACS Chain Management Mission of creating a rich and healthy automotive society.

The mental and physical health of our employees is one of our three management pillars. Since our foundation in 1947 we have been working to maintain and improve employee health. To realize our Vision 2050 - Creating Our Future Together, we must be a positive organization that is exciting and filled with energy. 
AUTOBACS SEVEN will continue to increase its own awareness of employee mental and physical health and to contribute extensively to society by strongly moving forward with health management.

AUTOBACS SEVEN has established its Health and Productivity Management Promotion Committee to be the body implementing health management initiatives within AUTOBACS SEVEN.
Internal health management promotion bodies, the AUTOBACS Health Insurance Organization, the UA Zensen All AUTOBACS SEVEN Union and the AUTOBACS Group Welfare Association constitute the Health and Productivity Management Promotion Committee, which discusses the implementation of specific measures.

To create healthy and safe workplace environments, the Health and Productivity Management Promotion Committee studies issues related to industrial safety and health, such as the reduction of overtime and the mitigation of industrial injury risks, in addition to six prioritized issues in health management. Information about the activities of the committee will be shared internally through the Safety and Health Committee. We believe that these efforts will help increase the vitality of our organization as a whole and increase corporate value. 

Beyond the Safety and Health Committee, our internal health management promotion organization includes an internal health consultation service. The internal health management promotion organization includes a public health nurse. The public health nurse works with our industrial physicians and clinical psychologists to advise employees on their health, including mental health, and support them to enable them to improve their lifestyles.

We make mental health consultation services provided by outside specialist organizations available to employees using the ICT service provided by the AUTOBACS Health Insurance Organization.

Issues addressed in health management

As stated in AUTOBACS SEVEN's Health Management Declaration, we believe that the mental and physical health of our colleagues lays the foundation for a bright and vigorous future. 

Accordingly, we work to discourage presenteeism and absenteeism, decrease the number of days of absence and leave due to injuries and diseases and improve our employees’ engagement in their work with the objective of increasing the productivity of our employees through health management. We disclose our health management targets and initiatives as our health management strategy map in a bid to enable all of our employees to share our aspirations and leverage the PDCA cycle to improve our efforts.
 

Effects expected from health management

Ultimately, we expect that health management will result our maintaining stable relationships with all stakeholders. 
To increase corporate value, which is important from the perspective of our investors and shareholders, and to retain our current customers and cultivate new ones, we need to be an organization that enables our employees to have job satisfaction. Mental and physical health is a prerequisite for this. We believe that employee health impacts the length of our healthy life spans, both while we are working for AUTOBACS SEVEN and also after retirement. 

We are certain that a positive corporate attitude towards health management will increase the job satisfaction of our employees, make our recruitment activities more successful, increase employee retention, and enable our employees to live better after they have retired. 

In addition to the targets we have set for the growth of our business, we strive to meet specific health management targets, including a 90% presenteeism target, an absenteeism target of enabling our employees to miss 0.7 days of work or less, the target of reducing absence and leave due to injuries and diseases to 1,200 days or less, and the target of achieving a work engagement score of 3.0 or higher.

Prioritized issues

All AUTOBACS Group employees are united in their strong efforts to address the health management issues indicated in the table below. This achieves two objectives: the establishment of an organizational culture which enables employees to think about the impact of their individual health on corporate value in the context of the health management strategy map and contributing greatly to society.

The general public is aware that smoking adversely effects health, including increasing the likelihood of cancer and aggravating the symptoms of lifestyle-related diseases. Unfortunately, the smoking rate of AUTOBACS Group is still higher than average. It is our top priority. It is an issue that must be addressed to enable our employees to maintain and improve their physical health. 

We understand that the prevention of cancer and lifestyle-related diseases will help improve the physical health of employees and extend their healthy life spans. We also believe that mental health is a significant issue as it is closely linked to productivity, employee job satisfaction and work engagement. 

We must strongly encourage our female employees to play active roles, and a part of this is ensuring that we address the health problems that impact women. 

We will improve the organizational environment and the environment of our workplaces so that all of our employees can take ownership as we address these issues.

To maintain and improve the mental and physical health of each of our employees, we are pursuing specific measures based on the priority issues to be addressed. We are also evaluating the efficacy of these measures and setting new KPI targets accordingly as part of the PDCA cycle of our overall health management.

●We provide enhanced, specific health guidance and health management training to employees at high risk of lifestyle-related diseases. Those receiving specific health guidance showed a greater improvement in their body mass index (BMI) and their exercise habits compared to other employees. Of eligible employees, 58.1% received health management training, and improvements were seen in their drinking habits, consumption of breakfast, and physical exercise habits.

●In the area of mental health, an e-learning program on the key points of self-care and management supervised by a clinical psychologist has been created and made available. The percentage of high-stress employees in FY2021 was 10.7%, an improvement from the previous fiscal year.

*1 The campaign was first held in fiscal year ending March 2018 and not held in fiscal year ending March 2019. The figures for fiscal year ending March 2020 to 2022 separately show the number of participants in the first half and the second half. The figures for fiscal year ending March 2022 are actual values.
*2 Includes overtime hours within statutory working hours are included.
 

*3 Percentage of people drinking 360 mL or more of an alcoholic beverage per drinking occasion
*4 Percentage of people exercising for 30 minutes or longer at least twice per week
*5 Average health literacy of employees according to survey results (using the communicative and critical health literacy (CCHL) scale)
 

*6 The figures for 2021 are actual values, not projections.
*7 The retention rate reflects the number of full-time employees remaining employed and is calculated using the following formula: (1 - number of people who resign / (number of employees at the beginning of period + number of employees joining the company during the period) x 100.
*8 The figure shows an average of ratings on a scale from 1 to 4, on which a higher score indicates a better condition.
*9 Results of an employee survey using the University of Tokyo's single item version of the Single-Item Presenteeism Question (SPQ).

Our shared values are presented in the AUTOBACS SEVEN Health Management Declaration and we believe that the establishment of healthy and safe workplace environments in line with our values will result in an energetic atmosphere throughout the organization and be a driving force for the realization of our Vision 2050 - Creating Our Future Together. We will incorporate this into all of our business activities to increase safety and health and enable the implementation of independent safety and health activities throughout the company.

Regarding the creation of a healthy workplace culture, exercise habits and health, we continue activities to protect and improve the health of the employees of the AUTOBACS Group and their families.

Diversity and inclusion

We promote inclusive practices and provide equal opportunities regardless of gender, race, nationality, or disability etc.

Health support

The AUTOBACS Health Insurance Organization takes the initiative in organizing health conferences for health promotion managers and personnel from the Health Insurance Organization every September. In addition, we conduct health support activities including smoking cessation initiatives, dental checkup programs and a smartphone app for people suffering from back pain. 

Employee’s Health Management Rated Loan Program by Development Bank of　Japan Inc. is the world’s first loan program which introduced a professional method of “employee’s health management rating” to assess and select excellent companies in initiatives for considering employee’s health.　

   The Company was rated at the highest level for consecutive four years as was　the case in 2015, 2017, and 2019, deemed to be especially excellent in initiatives for considering employee’s health.

The Certification System for Excellent Health Management Corporations was launched in 2017 to recognize corporations that practice particularly excellent health management based on their efforts to address local health issues and the promotion of health promoted by the Japan Health Council. 
   The company received certification as a 2023 Certified Health and Productivity Management Outstanding Organization (Large Enterprise Category). The company has been certified as an excellent health management corporation every year since the system was launched.