Nintendo Is Ranked The Third Most Sought-After Employer In Japan

I would have loved to have worked for Nintendo back in the day. Probably would still now. But I don't have quite enough demonstrable skill and talent in whatever gaming related area to be able to ever get that gig methinks. And I'm piss old now too, so I'm probably past the point of being relevant as compared to all the young folks coming out of university with degrees in game design and programming and stuff. Shame, because I actually think I could have a lot to offer them in the right role.

I heard that you have to be at least an uncle to qualify working at Nintendo.

And who is the first?

By the way:

“Of course, Nintendo’s comprehensive benefits play a role in this. They have a high rate of paid vacation utilization, offer strong support for parenting, and have a unique point system for employees that can be used for games, books, travel, and more."

Applies to almost everyone at some point, so I can understand how that would make the company rate so highly in such a survey.

"They also have a deep understanding of diversity and have introduced a partnership system that allows employees with same-sex partners to be treated as if they were married, among other progressive and practical initiatives."

Such a minority consideration, especially in Japan, that I highly doubt that's a genuinely significant factor as to why people rated the company so highly. And it's strange to see it specifically singled out and mentioned beside those other things, especially when there's surely so many other things the company does and offers that I am 100% sure apply to far more of the current and potential workforce there.

What about stuff like the sector and types of projects and areas of work within the company people can apply for, flexibility in working times, proper overtime consideration, parking and access, how close housing is and how close the schools are, the various travel options to be able to get there easily, what kind of training programs they have if any, how upward mobility is considered and supported, pension schemes, etc.

But I guess this is indicative of the times we're living in that some total niche consideration that's irrelevant to 99.99% of employees is highlighted in the press quote, while a whole bunch of things that are genuinely relevant and important to 99.99% of employees aren't.

Here's a personal question that I know is also far more relevant to far more people than their initiatives around people who are married to someone of the same sex: What's Nintendo's policy on employing old farts like me, and what are their initiatives around that?

And I'm not talking about people who have been there for decades already and have simply aged with the company, but people applying for new jobs now who are say older than 50. Because, hey, I'd like a job there, but I'm quite old you see.

Or is being old/older not quite as worthy of discussion and initiative consideration in our modern diverse, equitable, and inclusive employment society as some things that are far more niche yet seem to garner a massively disproportionate amount of consideration and attention these days?

I'm genuinely curious on that one.

@1UP-HUSKY That's why they have same-sex benefits. You know the saying: "There's always a gay unkle, and if you don't know one, it's probably you" 😂

Ofcourse Nintendo would be on the top, they are fantastic to work for. The previous President CEO (Satoru Iwata) gave himself a paycut just so that no one at Nintendo would loose their jobs, if that does not speak high volumes of them, then idk what would.

@RetroGames you just said that you don’t have quite enough skill or talent to be hired there in the first place, so I think you answered your own question as to why they wouldn’t hire an ‘old fart’ like you.
The article doesn’t mention anything about the average age of employees so how would we know their policy around that?
Keep sticking to the NintendoLife comments section and maybe someone will notice ye and offer you a position.

Just makes you respect Nintendo all the more, I'd say. I know I'd definitely love to work for them if the stars aligned better. Oh to be Japanese AND a Nintendo employee...

1) who the heck is Itochu?

2) How is Konami still in the top 50?!

I'd definitely want to work for Nintendo if I was Japanese. As a Brit, I definitely do not want to work for Nintendo.

It seems to me NoA and NoE are marginalised all the time. I'd expect it to be an incredibly frustrating "do as you're told" place to work. No thank you!

For those wondering, Itochu seems to be a multi-business company, according to Wikipedia: textiles, machinery, metals and minerals, energy and chemicals, food, general products and realty.
Seemingly with subsidiaries in other countries (never would have I imagined Mexico would have one)

Meanwhile, Ajinomoto is on the food business.

@Zeebor15 About Konami, I'm guessing the pachinko business does pay off for them.

@Solomon_Rambling "1 in 10 people in Japan identify within the LGBTQ+ community"

Sure, if you say so.

And I presume your position is that stat, be it true or fake, is more important and relevant to the vast majority of Japan's population of people looking for employment than everything I mentioned, thus it's mention in the press quote over all of the other stuff I listed, which was my entire point.

Now, obviously I disagree and think those other things are far more relevant and important to most people looking for a job, even in Japan where "1 in 10 people in Japan identify within the LGBTQ+ community", apparently.

@RetroGames You sound mad because people are pointing out the beloved Japanese company is diverse and "woke". It's a good thing to point out mate, don't be triggered.

@PessitheMystic Aye, but I'm still curious as to whether they have initiatives in place for old farts that do have the skillz to pay the billz. They didn't mention that in the press quote--although they did make sure to mention initiatives for people in same sex marriages--so I still don't know.

Or are initiatives for old people, of which almost every person on Earth will be at some point, not quite as important as making sure the things they listed are considered, which obviously they deem as very important and relevant to all the budding Nintendo employees out there.

It's actually a serious question given the times we live in, with all the focus on presumably authentic diversity, equity, and inclusion, and the way this kind of stuff is going.

Because real diversity, equity, and inclusion should mean a large percentage of the newly recruited workforce is indeed old farts, if it's authentically about truly-genuine diversity, equity, and inclusion--right.

But, of the three or so things they deemed important enough to mention in that press quote, their initiatives for old fuddy-duddies wasn't one of those unfortunately, which is strange given old folks is the fastest growing demographic across the board.

I’ve family employed within Nintendo and they do indeed love their employment there

Don't let the "nintendo is evil" crew that lurk here read this article! They might burn into ash.

I can't face the commute

My uncle works at Nintendo and my uncle's uncle worked at Nintendo and the legendary experiences and secrets they have gained throughout the years are astounding. The stories these guys tell are legendary.

@Solomon_Rambling Yeah, reports be reports. I've seen many legit reports and many garbage ones in my time*. Dunno what category the ones you linked fall into, but I'd suggest any studies and reports not based on hard math, objective numbers, and pure science should be careful of any confirmation bias and cognitive dissonance creeping in. Doesn't really make a difference to my point there.

That's fine. I was giving my take and position on that. It wasn't asking about your opinion or stating what your opinion was. You do you.

And the point of my original post around this remains the same.

*Here's a report [or random article online that links to some reports] for example:

https://www.spiked-online.com/2024/04/04/no-dei-is-not-good-for-business/

and

https://www.spiked-online.com/2023/09/29/why-diversity-training-backfires/

Now, do you automatically trust and believe those articles just because you can read them somewhere?

Good reminder the people who loosely throw around words like anticonsumer do not exist in the real world. Nintendo doesn't turn out quality content this long by accident. But people are still keen to prop up instead all these companies big and small who dump their talent the moment the job is done, because they say the right words.

@MeanBeanEgg No, you sound mad that someone is questioning its "wokeness". Hell, female employees at Nintendo of Japan only number 19%. Women are half the population. So I don't think the number of LGBT employees would be very high.

Which kinda affirms that guy's point.

@Bobb I never said anything about treating them anything other.

What I brought up was the fact this relatively irrelevant consideration around same sex marriage when deciding what company they want to work for, as it for most people, was specifically highlighted while many other actually far more relevant factors were clearly not--I listed a whole bunch of them--and I question the reasoning behind that.

I highly doubt the majority of people care about Nintendo's policy on same sex marriages over any of those examples I listed. So I think they'd have been better off listing a few more of the actually relevant examples that apply to the mass majority of people when looking for a job personally, if the idea is to promote some solid examples of why the company is third highest on the list of places people want to work in Japan.

And, given their choice to specifically emphasize one very random and very niche initiative examples, I'm curious about the incentives for older applicants and employees and how they assure fully diversity, equity, and inclusion in that area.

@Bobb Of course.

Or, you could view it as some cheap play that focuses on some very niche consideration that then comes at the cost of talking about some more of the incentives that are the actual real reasons why Nintendo made it to third place on the list. There's only so much time and space to make a truly relevant quote for journalists to print. And, like I said, I don't think Nintendo's policy on same sex marriage is one the vast majority of people would care about to be honest, so they just wasted an entire third of that moment to talk about what makes Nintendo a great place to work and why it actually matters to the vast majority of people who will ever see and read such a quote imo.

If Nintendo is the third most sought after employer in Japan, I'd actually like to know a few more of the widely meaningful to the largest majority of people reasons why that's the case. I don't really care about them extolling some very niche area of progressive thinking that largely doesn't matter to anyone in the grand scheme of things. I care about them showing me like a top ten incentives and reasons people are picking them--the ones most of us will actually be interested in learning about--not something that's almost certainly like thirtieth down the list or whatever, if it even appears on the vast majority of people's lists at all. Or--and let's pretend this is a real example for a moment--they might as well say they have added nice smelling soap into the bathrooms and that contributed to them gaining that revered third place spot, because I'm sure that's important to a couple of people too, maybe even still more than those who care about incentives in place around same sex marriages.

I'd still like to know some more of the legit top ten or so list of meaningful reasons Nintendo is the third most sought after company to work for in Japan. And, because of one of the very random examples they specifically chose to mention instead, I'd still like to know what their incentives are for old farts who want to work there too--because it goes to how truly legit they are about diversity, equity, and inclusion vs virtue signalling to a tiny niche of often really vocal people who are also often very activist about being acknowledged imo.

But, hey, that's just my take on it.

I say to Nintendo, Top 10 legit reasons you made it to third place--or it didn't happen!

Nearly got a job at Itochu Germany earlier this year.
Nintendo would be even better of course. ^^

@Arkay I disagree. You've given the best reason possible to let the "Nintendo is evil" crew read this article!

@TruestoryYep I sound mad? Ahahahahah, if you say so mate.

@FirstEmperor you know what? I think you're absolutely right!

Because of my religious views, I believe in "traditional" marriage between a man and a woman. But, I understand that not everyone has the same religious convictions as me. So, if a couple are going to pursue a gay relationship anyways--whether I think it's sinful or not--they may as well have the same benefits as straight couples. As a guy with socially Conservative views, I don't see that as anything "woke."

They deserve the same rights and protections as me because it's true that they aren't hurting anybody. We don't have to agree with each other's lifestyle decisions to still show basic human decency and respect. That goes both ways, though, and I shouldn't have to hide my Christian faith any more than someone else should have to hide their sexuality. It used to be that gay people were told to keep it in the bedroom because nobody wants to hear about it. But now, it's that people should keep their faith in the church because nobody wants to hear it.

Nobody should be ashamed of being their authentic selves. My faith is just as important to my core identity as someone else's sexuality. We should both have the liberty to be open about it, have difficult but mutually respectful conversations about it, agree to disagree, and still love each other at the end of the day and be willing to lend a helping hand to our fellow neighbor.

I'm a little nervous about posting this one, to be honest, as I'm not sure what the reception is gonna be. This is one of those comments that I think will probably get deleted. But hopefully, it can lead to some productive conversations and help us understand each other a little better.

@RetroGames wow, you first comment captures my exact feelings. We must be similar in age 😅

Treat your employees well. What a concept!