• 
• 

 
On December 21, 2018, Prime Minister Shinzo Abe attended the first meeting of the Council on Mid-Career Recruitment and the Recruitment of Experienced Professionals at the Prime Minister’s Office.
 
The Prime Minister said in his opening address,
 
“Thank you very much for gathering here today in the midst of your busy schedules.
 
The reform to a social security system oriented to all generations is the biggest challenge for the Abe Cabinet as the declining birthrate and the aging of the population are rapidly advancing. In light of that, we have gathered here today managers of companies that are actively pursuing mid-career recruitment and the recruitment of experienced professionals and established this Council on Mid-Career Recruitment and the Recruitment of Experienced Professionals.
 
In this council, I would like all of you, the top managers, to introduce your pioneering efforts and I myself will stand at the forefront and lead a nation-wide movement towards the expansion of mid-career recruitment and the recruitment of experienced professionals.
Setting our sights on a 100-year life society, it is necessary to create a society in which people can reap success twice or more in different fields in the designated stage of their lives, by pursuing multiple career paths, so that all of them remain working actively. I believe that we must correct the practice that their education and career choice in their teens and 20s largely decide their lives’ paths.
 
To that end, we should develop multiple career ladders so that people advance their careers in line with their skills and achievements, regardless of their age or gender, by expanding mid-career recruitment and the recruitment of experienced professionals. I would like to continue our efforts to create a society in which people make their decisions more flexibly about their work styles and work locations and attempt new challenges multiple times according to their stage of life, and a society in which women and the elderly participate even more actively.
 
The top managers in attendance today are all those who position the expansion of mid-career recruitment and the recruitment of experienced professionals as an important pillar of their companies’ growth strategies and human resource strategies under this leading philosophy, and are actively making efforts to reform corporate culture and our culture at large. I would like to hear in detail about your initiatives you are currently promoting. 
 
Furthermore, we would like to hear from small- and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs), which are actively promoting mid-career recruitment and the recruitment of experienced professionals, about human resource needs and their efforts at the next meeting, which would be held early next year.
 
On top of that, by widely publicizing the state of various pioneering efforts and sharing them across the entire business community, I expect each company to work on the expansion of mid-career recruitment and the recruitment of experienced professionals in a way that suits them as well as intending to give due consideration over the support measures for SMEs to that end.
 
I ask Minister of Economy, Trade and Industry Seko and Minister of Health, Labour and Welfare Nemoto to submit proposals, which take into account the leading cases introduced today, for the discussions at the Council on Investments for the Future, and incorporate them into the implementation plan for the Growth Strategy to be approved next summer, while working together with Minister Motegi.”