Abstract:

This study investigates how young employees’ participation in management contributes to organizational transformation through structured cross-generational initiatives. As organizations worldwide confront rapid technological change and demographic shifts, integrating younger employees’ perspectives into strategic decision-making has become increasingly critical for organizational renewal.

However, large-scale empirical evidence on the effectiveness and implementation conditions of such initiatives remains limited, particularly in aging and hierarchical corporate contexts such as Japan.

To address this gap, we conducted a questionnaire survey of all 3,186 firms listed on the Tokyo Stock Exchange Prime and Standard markets and obtained 156 valid responses (valid response rate: 4.9%). The study classifies young employee participation initiatives into three types: (A) proposal systems (shadow board-type initiatives), (B) knowledge-sharing systems (reverse mentoring-type initiatives), and (C) regular exchange systems focused on informal intergenerational exchange. Drawing on Leader–Member Exchange (LMX) theory and Psychological Contract Theory, we examine how these initiatives relate to attitudinal and strategic organizational outcomes.

Initial comparisons indicated that all initiative types were positively associated with improvements in engagement, job satisfaction, and intergenerational understanding, while their strategic effects varied by initiative type and depended on executive commitment and implementation design.

Exploratory factor analysis identifies three outcome dimensions: Engagement (job satisfaction, commitment, and retention), Innovation (incorporation of young employees’ ideas and strategic development), and Learning (intergenerational understanding and organizational learning). Multiple regression analysis shows that Governance and Commitment—representing executive commitment and institutional support—consistently drive innovation across all initiative types. In contrast, Collaboration and Feedback mechanisms primarily drive employee engagement, while Training and Development supports the translation of informal dialogue into strategic and learning outcomes.

The findings suggest that participation initiatives must be structurally embedded—through executive commitment and governance design—to contribute to sustained engagement and innovation outcomes.

The academic contribution of this study lies in offering one of the first large-scale empirical examinations of structured inclusion of young employees’ perspectives in Japanese listed firms. It demonstrates how distinct initiative designs are associated with different patterns of engagement, innovation, and organizational learning. For practitioners, these results provide a framework for building inclusive governance structures that harness generational diversity as a driver of organizational transformation.

Please choose your submission type: Developmental Paper

Primary Track: Organisational Transformation, Change and Development

Keywords: Change Management

Menu

Ms. Maki Fujiwara