(New) Mutual Commitment Between Employer and Employee

November 25, 2025
by Noriyuki Morimoto

When asking someone for something, you need to present to the other party how fulfilling that request will benefit them. Therefore, whether it be business or government, the employer must offer compensation in order to hire and use people. But paying reasonable compensation for work is merely an exchange of equivalent value; it provides no special benefit to the employee.

Indeed, for a merchant to demand that a customer buy a product, they must demonstrate the product’s utility to the customer. Yet from the customer’s perspective, they are paying the price as compensation for the product’s utility, so there is no special benefit there either.

People do not work solely for compensation. To effectively put people to work, something beyond compensation must be offered—that is, some special benefit. Typically, this takes the form of job satisfaction, a sense of purpose, or opportunities for growth and self-improvement. Recently, the work-style reform movement has increased the diversity of such benefits, such as allowing ways of working that suit one’s personal circumstances.

Needless to say, employers aim to elicit diligence, hard work, a strong work ethic, improved productivity, and creativity from employees by offering these special benefits.

Now, even if the employer offers growth opportunity as a special benefit to the employee, it won’t be a special benefit for someone without the aspiration to grow. In other words, from the employer’s perspective, the issue is how to select the right people to offer special opportunities to; from the employee’s perspective, it is about voluntarily seizing an opportunity to grow. The essence of personnel management boils down to providing growth opportunities only to those who seek to grow.

What matters here is commitment. The employee commits to the effort of growth, while the employer commits to supporting that effort and rewarding the results of that growth. This mutual commitment is the very essence of human resources management.

 

[Category /Financial Regulations]