Japan’s lenders break with Wall Street by embracing hybrid work

Workers at Japanese banks aren’t having to rush back to the office, unlike their counterparts on Wall Street, even as the country gradually returns to normal life after the pandemic.

The nation’s three largest lenders — Mitsubishi UFJ Financial group, Sumitomo Mitsui

Financial group and Mizuho Financial group  — said they are allowing more flexibility, eschewing a minimum number of office days per week, as experienced elsewhere.

That marks a contrast with places like New York, where bosses are increasingly expecting workers to show up in Manhattan offices as banks including Goldman Sachs Group Inc. and Morgan Stanley have removed the final hurdles for full-time, in-person work. Still, there’s also been an acknowledgment in some quarters that more flexibility is needed in the post-Covid age.

Even as Japan takes its most significant step yet towards reopening borders, the nation’s biggest banks say they are getting feedback from employees about greater productivity thanks to remote work. That’s a major timesaver in Tokyo where many employees commute for at least an hour each way.

What’s more, attendance rates are already high. Currently, about 60% of those working at MUFG’s Tokyo headquarters go to the office, a spokesperson said.

Mizuho, Japan’s third-largest lender, said it is up to each workplace to decide how often employees need to show up at the office. Mizuho started opening satellite offices in suburbs in late 2020, such as the one in Tachikawa, a 40-minute train ride from the bank’s headquarters. They are converted from conference rooms in retail branches and other facilities, so that staff can save on commuting hours to downtown Tokyo.

The bank had 21 such locations at the end of September and plans to open more, based on actual usage and employee feedback, according to a spokesperson. Rival banks have also opened satellites. The core unit of larger rival MUFG sees many wanting to keep remote work as an option, citing commuting as one of the reasons.

Even in the US, where they have a presence, there’s no uniform policy requiring workers to be in the office, according to spokespeople for both the banks. Like in Japan, the level of in-person presence required depends on the team.

Sumitomo Mitsui’s core banking unit plans to continue a hybrid-work approach, which some employees say is more efficient to take care of family, according to a spokesperson.

For Japan’s bankers, work-from-home was almost unheard of before Covid-19. At the onset of the pandemic, some bank employees had to rely on smartphones due to a shortage of company laptops.

But unlike other major wealthy countries, Japan did not resort to lockdowns even during the height of the virus. Instead, the government asked businesses to curb the number of people working in offices by up to 80%, reinforcing hybrid work as an option.

The banks’ hybrid approach has drawn comparisons with Japan’s Cool Biz campaign that started in the 2000s, which encouraged office workers to wear casual clothing in summer to reduce energy consumption from air-conditioning.

—Bloomberg