In-House Training during Japan’s High-Growth Period: Examining the Case of Fuji Iron & Steel

This paper explores changes in the in-house training systems at major firms in postwar Japan. In the 1950s, companies usually hired new middle school graduates as technicians. As a growing proportion of students began going on to high school, however, companies started struggling to find middle school graduates to fill positions. The recruitment demographics shifted; by the late 1960s, high schools had begun displacing middle schools as the primary source of new technicians. Approaches differed by company and location, however. One example was Fuji Iron & Steel’s Muroran Works in Hokkaido, where the increases in high-school attendance rates trailed the proportional growth on Japan’s main island. In that context, therefore, the Muroran Works continued to provide training and education for middle school graduates into the 1960s. However, changes began to occur shortly thereafter. In FY1961, the facility changed the name of its Wanishi Private Technical School to Fuji Iron & Steel Muroran Technical High School and extended the course of study from two years to three years. In FY1964, meanwhile, the school introduced correspondence courses. The changes effectively altered the nature of the institution, allowing students at Fuji Iron & Steel Muroran Technical High School to obtain high school–graduate qualifications. Mitsubishi Electric offers an example of another approach. Placing its focus on helping technical trainees cultivate the abilities they would need to succeed as versatile, multi-skilled workers with a broad grounding in liberal arts, the company made that refinement the core of its education and training efforts.