The Hardest Market is an independent publication on Japan's talent market, read from inside it. For people who hire and lead in Japan, it publishes what employers disclose about their people, the employment-law changes that affect them, and analysis, in English and Japanese.
What's here
- Japan Human Capital DataWhat 3,789 listed companies and 26,575 unlisted employers disclose about their people: headcount, pay, women in management, parental leave and more, in English and Japanese.
- RankingsNational top-50 lists on women in management, the gender pay gap, fathers' leave, overtime and paid leave, with prefecture and industry rankings in Japanese.
- Japan HR statisticsQuotable statistics on Japan's workforce, each with its source and a ready-made citation.
- Foreign subsidiaries in JapanThe Japan entities of foreign groups, with parent and home country.
- Labour Law Tracker47 employment-rule changes in Japan, with their effective dates.
- Japan HR Glossary283 Japanese HR terms explained for employers.
- HR Service DirectoryEnglish-capable sharoushi, employment lawyers, payroll, occupational health, visa and other specialists, and the free public services to try first.
- The newsletterEvery other week on hiring, HR and the talent market in Japan.
- The bookThe Hardest Market in the World: a guide to executive recruitment in Japan.
- Data plansEvery company's figures with benchmarks, a members' dashboard, Excel and CSV files and an API.
Who makes it
The Hardest Market is published by Makana Partners K.K., an executive search firm in Yokohama, and edited by its Managing Director, Yan Sen Lu.
How the data is made
Everything starts from what employers publish themselves: annual securities reports, government databases and companies' own statements. Every figure is checked before it appears; where a filing is plainly wrong, we correct or withhold it and say so on the page. Each dataset's definitions and sources are on its methodology page. We use software, including AI tools, to process filings at scale, and what we publish is checked against the source.
Independence
Rankings and placements are never sold, and being a client of Makana Partners makes no difference to how a company appears. Answers to our employer survey are kept apart from Makana Partners' search business.
Corrections and contact
If a figure is wrong, or you have a question, write to editor@hardestmarket.com. We check every request against the original source and reply within ten business days. To quote our figures, credit "Source: The Hardest Market" and link to the page.