As the world changes rapidly, we need to embrace diversity more than ever

The embrace of diversity, equity and inclusion has become vitally important for companies that wish to be valued by customers and society at large while maximizing employees’ true potential.?

It’s even more critical in an environment of uncertainty as the world undergoes rapid change around geo-politics, climate change and accelerating interest in sustainability.??

?For me, embracing diversity means creating an environment where people mutually accept and value their differences, which will lead to realizing a productive, comfortable workplace.

Having spent my childhood and student days in Tokyo, Cairo, Osaka and Kuala Lumpur, I grew up feeling that diversity and inclusion were things that I took for granted.? When I joined Nissan in 2003, I found the company had diversity in its roots thanks to many employees with diverse backgrounds, so my own international background fitted in with the broader team.?

I recently spoke at the Nikkei Virtual Global Forum: Women in Innovation 2022 about the significance of embracing diversity for Nissan Motor Corporation .??

Enabling women is essential to providing diverse value to customers. To increase female representation at all levels, Nissan is providing various initiatives from recruiting, providing trainings, setting mentoring programs etc.??

But at Nissan we are not talking about gender diversity only. For us, diversity is a much wider topic. It is about embracing people’s differences, including nationality, age, experience, capabilities, culture, values, and sexual orientation and more.??

Nissan’s 130,000-plus employees are our most valuable asset. Across our global operations, our team works tirelessly to fulfill our corporate purpose of “driving innovation to enrich people’s lives.” Nissan conducts business in more than 160 countries, and the needs of our customers are varied. By embracing a diverse team, we can have different ideas, opinions and innovations – and our culture and approach toward diversity will help deliver value to these various customers. ??

?For example, we know that in Japan 40% of vehicle purchases and 60% of car-buying decisions are made by women. We reflect these specific characteristics and the needs of female drivers by creating family-oriented products, as it’s important to enable women in our workplace and in society. Our recently launched new Nissan Serena allows easy entrance, loading and unloading in small parking spaces – typical for narrow parking areas in Japan. And the sliding passenger door comes with the hands-free, auto-open function , which is very convenient if your hands are full.?

At our facilities around the world, we encourage experienced employees to share their knowledge and experience with younger members of the team, creating inclusive environments and equal opportunities to showcase their potential. Our team in Brazil, meanwhile, undertakes efforts to make work easier for employees with hearing impairments, creating materials and conducting townhalls supported with sign language.??

I see our continuing embrace of diversity not as an objective, but as part of our corporate culture and a way of working. It’s a foundation for our organization to express its full capabilities. We see it as an ongoing practice, a commitment to establishing deep within our culture the space to hear from individuals with different opinions and experiences. ??

We continuously work to ensure our leadership team can embed these effective changes within the business and empower employees to drive them from the bottom up. Embracing diversity isn’t just a verbal commitment, but the most important part of our organization and something we practice and cherish each day.?

If you missed Women in Innovation 2022, please click on this link to go to the Nikkei website.