Case Study - Toyo Construction Co., Ltd.
Toyo Construction Co., Ltd. was established on July 3, 1929 with the goal of reclaiming land off the coast of Naruo Village, Muko County, Hyogo Prefecture (now Nishinomiya City) and building a major industrial port and petrochemical complex. Over the 90 years since then, the company has expanded its business domains to include land-based civil engineering, architecture, overseas, and offshore wind power, while working to develop high-quality social capital that supports people's lives. Starting in fiscal 2023, the company is aiming to make further strides toward its 100th anniversary, with the theme of its medium-term management plan being "A company that takes on the challenges of going from defense to offense."
Toyo Construction is a company with a diverse track record in the construction field, not only as a marine construction company but also as a general contractor. We spoke with Mr. Hara, Section Manager of the Construction Department of the Construction Business Division, about the behind-the-scenes system that supports human resource development in the Construction Business Division.
*Department names are as of the time of the interview in April 2024.
In addition to company-wide common education, Toyo Construction's Construction Business Headquarters and Civil Engineering Business Headquarters each focus on human resource development.
The Construction Business Headquarters aims to develop "initiative people" and "creative engineers." The OJT manual used in the Construction Business Headquarters stipulates that "encourage awareness reform" and "promote active self-development" in order to take concrete actions that will lead to improved skills. To achieve this, we efficiently implement OJT and OFF-JT and actively support employees.
The "10-year education program" was one of the education measures that started in 2014, and was implemented as a correspondence course. Specifically, the Construction Business Headquarters distributed assignments to the trainees through on-site OJT leaders, and the trainees were given feedback on their answers with corrections and comments, a process that continued for 10 years from the time of joining the company.
However, in 2022, in light of busy work conditions on site and the 2024 problem in the construction industry (limits on overtime work), the course was changed from "required" to "optional." This resulted in the number of people submitting assignments falling by half, and a problem arose where the learning level gap between those who took the course and those who did not was widening.
It is being used in two ways: to distribute the curriculum of the "10-year education program" to construction workers, and to allow people other than construction workers to take the e-learning library.
The curriculum for the "10-year education program" is based on a unique curriculum in which the level of difficulty changes from the first to the tenth year, and original questions and explanations have been created. Participants can learn about process management, creating construction drawings, and budget management, which will lead to the acquisition of knowledge and improvement of skills as construction workers.
"10-year education program" to improve the technical skills of young people
What does Toyo Construction Construction Division place emphasis on in its human resource development?
Issues before implementing SmartSkill Campus
Please tell us about the challenges you faced before introducing the LMS (Learning Management System) and the education you envision with the introduction of the LMS.
Therefore, we decided to change all training to group training in fiscal 2023, reducing the burden on OJT leaders and headquarters staff and eliminating inconsistencies in training due to the skills of the instructors. This had the advantage of allowing participants to see each other's ways of thinking and skills, but since there is a limit to the amount of time that participants can be held up in group training, the learning time was reduced to one-third compared to the distance learning format.
Based on this, in 2024, we have decided to conduct education in a hybrid format, where items where the correct answer is clear will be implemented through e-learning, and items with multiple ways of thinking and correct answers, items that require group work, and items with complex explanations will be held as group training, allowing us to distribute time and make the education more efficient without compromising the quality of the content.
How to use SmartSkill Campus
How are you using SmartSkill Campus?
Have there been any changes before and after the introduction of SmartSkill Campus?
Compared to the previous correspondence education system, this is expected to reduce the amount of editing and sending/receiving work required by head office staff by approximately 200 hours per year.
It has been about a month since the release, and active participants have already started learning at SmartSkill Campus. Some managers are also taking the course themselves to help train their subordinates. Going forward, we plan to further increase utilization rates by conducting awareness-raising activities through group training and other events.
Toyo Construction Co., Ltd.
The shift to e-learning for engineer training measures has significantly reduced the burden on OJT staff and head office staff
In the Construction Business Division, we improve the technical skills of our young employees through the "10-year education program" that develops site managers within 10 years of joining the company. In the 10 years after joining the company, employees tackle a total of 30 tasks, aiming to acquire the skills to "create a schedule," "create construction drawings and check their contents," and "create an execution budget" as on-site management methods.
When selecting an LMS (Learning Management System) vendor, what points did you consider important and what aspects of the system or support structure did you evaluate?
We really value the speed of response from the sales and customer success staff. It took four months from implementation to release this time, and we were grateful for the quick response that allowed us to proceed in a timely manner. In addition, the customer success staff visited our office many times to support us with the settings.
I feel that Revic Global is a company that understands the requirements of its customers and supports them along the way.
In order to enrich our employee training, we were considering introducing a system that would allow employees to efficiently take educational courses suited to their skills when our training manager introduced us to REVIC Global Co., Ltd.
The deciding factor for adopting the system was that it met our requirements, such as the ability to make detailed settings using the test function , and that it could create an environment where employees could learn "anytime, anywhere, and as many times as they wanted," in response to requests from field staff who wanted to be able to use their smartphones or iPads to study while commuting to the office or on the go.
Is there anything you would like to achieve or challenge in the future using SmartSkill Campus?
There are two things I want to achieve in the future. The first is to turn technical documents into content. There are still many technical documents lying dormant within the company, such as materials used in training and the know-how of veteran employees. I would like to use the content creation function to spread them horizontally.
The other is training management. We would like to use SmartSkill Campus to manage group training applications, questionnaires, and notifications and collection of pre-assignments, leading to improved work efficiency.
SmartSkill Campus is multifunctional, and I think there are still many features that I have not yet mastered. I will work with the customer success representative to realize what I want to do one by one.
Future outlook
Evaluation of REVIC Global's solutions
Please tell us about the "10-year education program" that your company is implementing.
The e-learning library, which is filled with knowledge and skills necessary for working adults, includes content that can be used for on-the-job training and for training new employees, new recruits, and young staff. Therefore, the library is open to construction technical staff and staff involved in construction sales, in addition to construction staff, so that they can study the content.
Company Name
Toyo Construction Co., Ltd.
Industry
Marine civil engineering/land civil engineering/construction industry
Number of people
Approximately 400 people
assignment
Reduce the workload of training staff
Creating an environment where learning can be done without time or place restrictions
