Sep 30 (Nikkei) - Honda Motor is introducing work-from-home allowances and rearranging its office spaces in the latest sign that large Japanese companies confronting COVID-19 are making gradual but permanent revisions to their corporate cultures.
"After experiencing teleworking at home, we realized it is possible to implement a new kind of work style we had never imagined," said Asako Suzuki, Honda's head of human resources and corporate governance. "It has become apparent that we were spending more time commuting and in meetings than was needed. [The pandemic and subsequent telework boom] made us reconsider our workflow from scratch."
Suzuki was speaking during an online news briefing on Tuesday.
In April, at the peak of Japan's outbreak, Honda allowed nearly 30,000 employees to work from home. The number represents over 70% of the automaker's total Japan workforce.
Next month it will suspend the traditional practice of paying employees' monthly commuter train expenses. In place of the stipend, Honda will provide a per-day allowance of 250 yen (about $2.35) to help employees cover their increased utility bills and the costs of any equipment they might have had to buy so they can work from home.
Some employees may also receive company support for their purchases of face masks, air purifiers and wireless routers.
Honda is also making arrangements for those still working out of the office. In some offices, desks are being moved to open space among workers, while in others partitions are going up to create booths for individual workers.
In addition, internal agreements and other documents that have previously required signatures in ink will now be digitized so that matters can be made official via email.
