On December 4, 2024, Recruit Holdings released Recruit Group Profile 2024: Inside Out. This digital media product is published annually to introduce Recruit Group’s initiatives and stories that cannot be conveyed through numbers alone to stakeholders around the world. This year’s issue is 53 pages long and packed with information on management strategy, business overviews of each Strategic Business Unit (SBU), and stories about the impact our corporate activities have had. We spoke with Minori Koshino and Yumiko Ota, two editors-in-chief who led the production and promotion of the Recruit Group Profile.

Recruit Group Profile: Inside Out Was Created to Pursue a Disclosure Style Truly Our Own

Recruit Holdings discontinued its traditional annual report (integrated report) in 2020, and began publishing the Recruit Group Profile: Inside Out (RGP) as a new Group overview. This was in light of global corporate disclosure trends and the needs of overseas institutional investors. There was growing momentum within the Group to increase the nonfinancial information in the annual report translated from our Yukashouken Houkokusho (regulatory annual report in Japan), and was decided as we were considering the production of the 2020 Annual Report (Integrated Report).

“However, we knew that we would have more duplicated content in the integrated reports and the annual report if we did so,” says Minori, who served as editor-in-chief of the first edition of the RGP. “Institutional investors read through all disclosure materials before engaging in dialogue with us, and it would be inefficient to have them read the same thing over and over again. We thought once again about who the integrated report was for and what it should be like. It had already expanded to over 100 pages.”

Minori says she and her team reset their objectives from the perspective of information disclosure. “We decided to forget the existing framework, reorganized the roles of each of the information disclosure media, and eliminated the duplicated parts. As a result, we were left with stories that expressed the thoughts of the Group’s management and employees, which could not be fully expressed in the other corporate disclosure materials. We dedicated the RGP to just these.”

At the same time, under circumstances that made face-to-face work difficult due to the COVID pandemic, she says they also chose to drop the paper publication and go completely digital. “When I explained this to the management team and people in relevant departments, they were a bit surprised but ultimately supportive. They said: ‘It’s a unique approach, but we like the idea. Go for it.’ In fact, the benefits in terms of production process and cost were greater than we anticipated, and the feedback from investors was generally positive. We’re happy that we gave it a try.”

The RGP was therefore repositioned as a Group introduction media product. Yumiko, the current editor-in-chief, has been involved in its publication since 2021 and is leading the continuous evolution of the medium.

“The RGP was started with the concept of collecting various stories about the impact created by people working for Recruit Group — which operates in more than 60 countries around the world — through its corporate activities, from inside the company (Inside) to society (Outside),” she explains.

“For those who want to know in-depth about specific initiatives, rather than just our business model and the financial information, we’ve been working hard to create a product that vividly conveys the reality of the seriousness and progress of our three core management strategies: Simplify Hiring, Help Businesses Work Smarter, and Prosper Together,” Yumiko continues. “In the early days, we were producing a lot of articles just for the RGP, but we’ve now put in place a dedicated production system and workflow. We simply select the best pieces from the content that has been published in advance on our Group’s media, including corporate websites, and curate it in the RGP.

“It’s difficult for busy people to find and read all the latest information from the vast amount of corporate blogs and SNSs of each Group company,” she adds, “so we came up with the concept of an annual curation media product that brings together the year’s evolution and progress in one place. The RGP is a package of information that we want all of our stakeholders to see.”

Yumiko Ota (left) and Minori Koshino (right), two editors-in-chief who led the production and promotion of the RGP

Conveying the Reality of Sustainability Management

Yumiko also has this to say about the highlights of the report. “In recent years, the RGP has devoted many pages to our commitment to sustainability, Prosper Together, the third pillar of our management strategy. Recruit Group considers sustainability and business as one and the same, and institutional investors around the world have recognized the fact that we’ve placed our mid-term social impact goals in the middle of our business as a singular and cutting-edge example of sustainability management practices. We also believe it is essential to share this kind of external evaluation as objective information, so we’ve also included messages from external parties in RGP 2024.”

Yumiko also says that the team is conscious of making design and UX-related improvements and innovations that reflect the times.

“Last year, for example, we used AI-generated illustrations against the backdrop of a lively discussion on AI. We also added alternative text (alt) to images to address accessibility, made links from the table of contents to individual pages tabbed for those who do not use a mouse, and improved visibility through better color selection. We always try new production methods, however modest they may be.

“This year’s theme is ‘Inclusive,’ intending to keep an eye on the accelerating social divisions in the world,” she adds. “In terms of content, we’ve aimed to ensure comprehensive coverage of regions and business units, while visually expressing this theme through the use of Venn diagram designs on the cover and throughout the pages.”

Always Evolving to Meet the Needs of the Times

Yumiko explains the RGP’s core message, which has remained unchanged since the publication of the fifth issue: “We’ve added a new section on human capital, which has been attracting attention in recent years, to introduce the initiatives in our SBUs. While each SBU has its own characteristics, the common thread that runs throughout Recruit Group is the belief that “Our strength comes from within,” and the growth mechanism to bet on the passion of each individual to turn their power into organizational strength. Through the stories from each SBU, I hope you can feel the unwavering stance and commitment to people that Recruit has evolved since its founding as a survival mechanism for the company through the ages.”

Yumiko shares some challenges ahead. “With initiatives like the EU’s Corporate Sustainability Reporting Directive and the Securities and Exchange Commission in the U.S., global efforts to establish standards for corporate sustainability disclosures are accelerating, and various reporting frameworks and standards are being developed. In this context, we need to reconsider the value that RGP, with its story-centered approach, can offer. ”

Finally, Yumiko expressed her enthusiasm for the coming year, saying: “I hope we can take this opportunity to refine the RGP into something even more beneficial and relevant to readers, with a freestyle that truly reflects Recruit.”

Minori Koshino

Group Manager, Communication Planning Group of Group Communications Department and the Sustainability Transformation Department Recruit Holdings Co., Ltd.

After graduating from a university in the U.S., Minori started her career as a communications specialist at a Japanese automobile R&D center. In 2010, she came back to Japan and joined a pharmaceutical company, where she led numerous communications projects connecting Japan and the world throughout its transformative globalization period. She joined Recruit Holdings in 2019 and has since led projects such as integrated reporting as an editor-in-chief and various creative initiatives. Minori currently serves as group manager in the Group Communications Department’s Planning Group and the Sustainability Transformation Department, where she is responsible for promoting the company’s commitment to sustainability.

Yumiko Ota

Sustainability Transformation Department Recruit Holdings Co., Ltd.

After graduating from university, Yumiko gained experience supporting special economic zones in emerging countries and launching social businesses. She later joined a digital marketing company focusing on social media, where she was involved in overseas marketing and SDG-related marketing. She has consistently sought to help resolve social problems. In November 2021, Yumiko joined Recruit Holdings. As a member of the Sustainability Transformation Department, she handles information disclosure, investor relations, and the planning and management of internal and external communication on ESG and sustainability activities, as well as website management in the Group Communications Department.