With support from the public sector and participation from multiple industries in the private sector, thought leaders on employee health and wellbeing in Japan have come together to establish the Wellness Management Council.

Wellness Management is a management philosophy that considers the physical and mental health of an organization’s employees as a centrally important resource, creating frameworks to promote and maintain health. Members of this council, through sharing information on implementing Wellness Management programs and resulting data, aim to improve the promotion of health of their employees. Furthermore, by evaluating the effect of Wellness Management on each company as a whole and sharing this data, the council aims to promote best practices of Wellness Management, widening its scope of activities both domestically and internationally.

With the participation of the Chairman, Vice-Chairman, Advisor and 48 member organizations, the Council of Wellness Management held its inaugural meeting on 21 December 2015.

Leadership:
Yoshinobu Shimamura, Chairman of the Council of Wellness Management, is a sports enthusiast and former Minister of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries as well as former Minister of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology and current Chairman of the Japan Professional Sports Association.

Takeshi Okawara, Vice-Chairman of the Council of Wellness Management, has made significant contributions to Japanese cuisine as the Chief Director of the Domestic Restaurantation Industry Chef Health Insurance Society, former Chairman of the Japan Food Service Association, as well as the Chief Director of the Organization to Promote Japanese Restaurants Abroad.

Tadateru Konoe, Advisor to the Council of Wellness Management, is the President of Japanese Red Cross Society.

Presentations:
The organizations selected to participate as standard-bearers for health management gave presentations on recent examples and organizational measures to illustrate how to create Wellness Management programs.

Council Activities:
The Council of Wellness Management aims to promote Wellness Management through the below activities:
- Sharing best practices of organizations engaged in Health Promotion, lessons learned from implementation of Wellness Management
- Research into the link between employee health and company productivity & results
- Research into the preventive measures possible from the collection and standardization of lifestyle habit data
- Activities leading to increased rates of health screenings
- Activities targeted at dietary education and the need to create healthy lifestyle habits, as well as lessons learned in implementing such activities


With the start of Stress Check (a government-mandated program initiated by Japan’s Ministry of Health, Labour and Welfare, requiring business with more than 50 employees to perform an annual evaluation of employee stress levels), the implementation of Wellness Management will become increasingly important as a component of managerial benchmarking. Together we aim to promote this philosophy with the aspiration that a shift towards management styles placing strong emphasis on employee health awareness will make Wellness Management a tenet of first-rate business management around the world.

An explanation on the forward-looking criteria for “Health & Productivity Stock Selection”* for organizations was given by Masami Fujioka (Assistant to the Director of Healthcare Industries Division at the Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry) and Shuhei Mori (Health Insurance Division, Health Insurance Bureau, Ministry of Health, Labour and Welfare).

*The Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry (METI) and the Tokyo Stock Exchange (TSE) for the first time, jointly selected 22 enterprises as the “Brand of Companies Enhancing Corporate Value through Health and Productivity Management (Health & Productivity Stock Selection)” and on March 25, 2015, METI hereby announces the enterprises as below. This selection is part of the efforts set in the Japan Revitalization Strategy. The Health & Productivity Stock Selection is a program in which METI and TSE select and introduce attractive enterprises to investors who prioritize improvement in corporate value from a long-term perspective. METI and TSE aim to make the program an incentive for more enterprises to undertake health and productivity management. (http://www.meti.go.jp/english/press/2015/0325_01.html)


■ 20 Founding Members of the Council of Wellness Management (In Japanese alphabetical order)
ANA Holdings Inc., Curves Japan Co., Ltd., Golf Digest Online Inc, GLP J-REIT, JoyFit (Wellness Frontier Co., Ltd.), SoftBank Group Corp., Tokyo Midtown Clinic, Nihon Kotsu Co.,Ltd., Neo Career Co., Ltd., Nestlé Japan Co., Ltd., Herman Miller Japan Inc., FamilyMart Co., Ltd., FiNC co., Ltd., Forbes JAPAN (atomixmedia, Inc.), Polaris Capital Group Co., Ltd., Mizuho Securities Co., Ltd., euglena Co.,Ltd., Yoshinoya Holdings Co., Ltd., Hot Yoga Studio LAVA (Venture Bank, Inc.), Link and Motivation Inc.


■ 28 Council of Wellness Management Participating Members Organizations (In Japanese alphabetical order) ※Current as of 21 December 2015
iMedical Inc., Allied Architects, Inc., airweave inc., Oisix Inc., All About, Inc., Karuizawa Tourism Association,　Karuizawa Social Design Research Center, Kewpie Corporation, CrowdWorks Inc, coconala Inc., Gordon Brothers Japan Co., Ltd., Sangyoui Inc, GeneQuest Inc., Space Market, Inc., Sompo Japan Nipponkoa Himawari Life Insurance Inc., The Dai-ichi Life Insurance Company, Limited, Takara Printing Co., Ltd., Tpoint Japan Co., Ltd., TABLE FOR TWO International, Denkosha Corporation, Medical Net Communications, Inc., Japan Health Promotion Club Secretariat, Mizuho Bank, Ltd., Mitsubishi Estate Co., Ltd., Mitsubishi Jisho Residence Co. Ltd., Rickie Business Solution Co.,Ltd., Loco Partners Inc., Rohto Pharmaceutical Co., Ltd.

■ Council of Wellness Management Observer
Kanagawa Prefecture
Kanagawa Prefecture Yokosuka City

■ Council of Wellness Management Inaugural Meeting 　

Support (Second Session): Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry

■ About the Council of Wellness Management
Establishment: 21 December 2015
Chariman: Yoshinobu Shimamura（Former Minister of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries; Former Minister of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology; Current Chairman of the Japan Professional Sports Association.）
Office:　Matrix Building 5F, 3-9-6 Ginza, Chuo-ku, Tokyo 104-0061, Japan
Secretary General: Fumio Norimatsu
Secretary General inquiry address:　[email protected]　　

Please direct any inquiries on the information contained in this release to:
Council of Wellness Management (℅ FiNC co., Ltd.)
Lucas Hannell
Telephone: +81 (0)3-6264-3401
Email: [email protected]