JOB INFORMATION
| JOB INFORMATION | Construction Assist |
| Employment Status | Full-Time Employment |
| Job Description | ・Preparation and Revision of Construction Plans ・Handling Construction Documents and Records ・Submission of Government Office Requirements |
| Qualifications | ・College Graduate/Bachelor’s Degree in Civil Engineering, Architecture, or any other construction-related programs ・Language Proficiency: a. Japanese Language – JLPT N3 Level or its Equivalent b. English Language – Business Level ・Related Expericence preffered but not required ・Construction CAD Proficiency |
| Working Hours |
a. Opening Time ( 8:30 ) Closing Time ( 17:30 ) b. Rest period ( 60 ) minutes c. Regular Working Days: Monday to Friday d. Regular Days Off: Saturday, Sunday and Public holiday, Year-end and New Year holidays ※Maximum of 8 hours per day; 40 hours per week |
※Two interviews are required
Construction Assist, a system provided by KM United.
Parent company Takenobe Co., Ltd. is one of the three oldest architectural painting companies in Osaka. Having been established 70 years ago, they decided to setup their subsidiary “KM United” in 2013. This is why KM United has been part of renovation and painting of famous large-scale properties such as Japan’s world famous “Himeji Castle”, Osaka Expo’s Tower of the Sun and the headquarters building of Nintendo.
Why would a company in the paint industry create another company in the same paint industry?
In the construction industry, the aging of craftsmen is rapidly advancing and various issues such as the transfer of skills and shortage of successors are resulting to the tightest labor market in the country’s history.
In Japan’s construction industry, the average age of active craftsmen is in their 40s, and this industry is aging faster than ever. Another issue is the long overtime hours of the site supervisors who are in charge of construction management. Until now, it has been said to take 10 years to become a full-fledged craftsman in the construction industry. Moreover, the only way to acquire skills was to watch and learn from others. It is an industry where even if new people came in, they would quit immediately.
To solve this issue, we created “KM UNITED, K.K. a company that aims to foster the inexperience and help them grow into top-class craftsmen. KM United has build a “Unique Training Program” that allows even inexperienced craftsmen to become full-fledged craftsmen in three years.
The strategy is to rehire a retired veteran craftsmen as instructors and pass on skill by teaching, teaching and teaching.
The number of people who want to join the company with no past experience in the industry has been increasing every year, and now we hire about 15 young craftsmen every year! As a result, we have become a company where the average age of craftsmen is in their 20s.
As a result, it was announced in the policy statement speech by former Prime Minister Abe.
The warden of Kiyomizu-dera Temple was so impressed with KM United’s efforts to nurture young craftsmen and pass on skills that they allowed us to be the first company in the 1,200-year history of Kiyomizu-dera Temple, to hold an induction ceremony for three consecutive years.
Our Challenges
We are a company that takes on a variety of challenges in the construction and painting industry. We developed “Skill Log”, a teaching material application that stores craftsmanship skills and allows you to learn anytime, anywhere on your smartphone.
In addition, we have also developed an attendance management app “Connected Careers” that specializes in the construction industry.
The challenge is not over yet, we have also developed a painting robot uses numerical values from the spraying process of craftsmen as parameters. It became possible to paint from times faster than one craftsman can.
The new line of work “Construction Assist”
In order to decrease the overtime work of the site supervisors, which is one of the major issues in the Japanese construction industry, a new line of work “Construction Assist” was established.
Reasons for quitting the Construction Industry
The construction industry lacks manpower. Moreover, this shortage of human resources is accelerating as more and more people, even site supervisors, wants to quit.
We wanted to do something about the situation. First, we investigated within the company by handing out questionnaires and performing operations analysis.
The results are as shown.
Long overtime hours and little to none vacation ranked at the top of the list.
In addition, fatigue and human relations were also part of the leading bunch.
Simultaneously, we conducted a survey asking which part of the job contributes the heaviest burden.
The results of the analysis is as shown.
Construction plans, record of proceedings, and photo documentation are the top culprits. As the result indicates, paperwork accounts for majority of the work.The matter of fact is a lot of site supervisors’ perception of the work that they will be doing is out of touch with reality. Thus, causing a job mismatch.
Shown here is typical day-to-day work of a site supervisor.
The need to do both paperwork and on-site supervision has resulted in a great deal of overtime hours which we assume is overloading supervisors with too much work.
Our analysis about site supervisors and construction assist indicates that…
As expected, even in our own company, paperwork accounted for 55.8%, and was the most common reason for wanting to quit.
To settle the issue, there is a need for human resources capable of assisting site supervisors.The specific skill set that is beneficial in assisting with construction affairs includes possess technical knowledge, which includes technical terms, jargons, etc. Can operate, produce and modify CAD software and drawings. And has a knack for communicating.
This is a problem for the construction industry as a whole, as this role cannot be filled immediately. Furthermore, the adoption of the Work Style Reform in the healthcare, transportation and our construction industries is fast approaching.
In Japan, other industries have already began adapting to this reform. It must be understood that this delay has shown that the construction industry is short of manpower. In line with this, there is a need for the construction industry to drastically cut overtime hours. Time is of the essence if we hope to make it on time.
KM United proposes a new system “Construction Assist” to solve to this problem.
The company employs high-value specialists and deploy them as Construction Assist staffs with the goal of supporting site supervisors in real-time
As mentioned in the survey and analysis results, it is evident that the volume of paperwork places a heavy burden to site supervisors.
Construction Assist brings value by taking responsibility so supervisors can focus in their on-site management duties.
For those who work as Construction Assist staffs, we mainly hire people who have the skills but cannot go to the job site every day due to some reasons, but want to continue their efforts to further improve their skills in the construction industry. We believe that by creating a comfortable working environment in the form of satellite offices, we can help these high-value people >to fulfill their potential.
To support Construction Assist staffs we developed apps specifically aimed to streamline work and provide on the job training.
First “Cone-kyari”. Coming from “Connected Careers”, this an app that is developed in-house which tracks and manages working hours.
Using “Cone-kyari” we can analyze working hours and visualize supervisory tasks to improve efficiency.
By analyzing operations, we can seek the tasks of the supervisor that can be supported by our Construction Assist staffs.
A increase in efficiency can be realized by sharing work. Through cooperation, we will be able to do highly productive work as a team.
Next is WazaLog (Skill log),
This app can be used anytime and anywhere to view instructional videos and help foster the skills of our engineer. And through the utilization of WazaLog, we further develop the professional skills of our Construction Assist staffs.
We have hired people who have experience working with major general contractors to serve as our instructors. Through our OJT, Construction Assist staffs are receiving top notch training.
Here is a snippet from WazaLog (Skill log),
This particular video explains how to prepare a road use application for government notification.
Next, here shown is a typical scene from the OJT the we provide.
This shows me actually going to the site and giving instructions.
By actually seeing the site, it becomes easier to visualize what the documents are for and thus helps deepen understanding.
Image of Training Programs For Construction Assist To Achieve Success
The Aims of Construction Assist
One of the strengths of our company is that we basically hire people as full-time employees, which allows us >to accumulate and share work without a three-year deadline.
In addition to this,by improving the skills and efficiency of Construction Assist staffs at each site and unifying the format that they are using, we can make it possible for two people to handle tasks that used to be done by three.
In this way, our company’s Construction Assist is not just a mere dispatch system, we also contribute >to the efficiency of your business.
As a result of implementing Construction Assist to our parent company, we achieved a 67.9% reduction in overtime hours.Based on this result we propose >to adopt our Construction Assist.
We would like to contribute to the reduction of overtime work and ultimately contribute in improving efficiency.