Echoas recruitment co., ltd.

We primarily operate a recruiting business for Japanese companies, with our main bases in Thailand and Taiwan. We established our Thailand subsidiary in 2013 and our Taiwan subsidiary in 2015 and have been introducing Japanese-speaking personnel locally for many years. Recently, against the backdrop of labor shortages in Japan, we have also launched a new business introducing highly skilled foreign professionals from Thailand and Taiwan to companies in Japan. We are focusing on educational activities to convey local cultures and candidate characteristics to Japanese companies that lack know-how in hiring foreign talent.

Before implementation, everything including resumes and progress management was paper based, meaning information was never shared across the company. Each staff member managed their own data individually, so getting a full picture of company operations required going through items one by one in meetings, consuming enormous amounts of time. I was frequently away on overseas business trips, and my inability to physically check paper documents to grasp the situation on the ground was a major issue.

After comparing several systems, the deciding factors for PORTERS were its multilingual capabilities, including English, and the clear explanations on its website. Furthermore, hearing directly from the sales representative gave us great peace of mind regarding the support structure. Being a Japanese product meant we could communicate subtle nuances in Japanese. The reasonable per-account pricing was also highly attractive.

Currently, we use it for all basic recruiting operations, such as candidate information management and selection process tracking. A major turning point was the COVID-19 pandemic. Previously, we used a mix of paper and the system, but the inability to commute to the office forced us to go 100% paperless. We have integrated our online forms with PORTERS so that data entered by candidates is automatically imported into the system. Additionally, we use the performance data recorded in PORTERS as the basis for calculating our consultants’ commissions. By directly linking data entry to performance evaluation, each consultant is naturally motivated to input data accurately, which keeps the quality and freshness of information consistently high. It is also worth noting that during the initial implementation phase, an IT-savvy team member took the initiative to configure and customize the system, which was instrumental in ensuring a smooth launch. Having that key person in-house was extremely fortunate.

The greatest result has been the dramatic improvement in operational efficiency through becoming completely paperless. Direct integration with online forms significantly reduced manual data entry, completely eliminating the need for dedicated data entry administrative staff. This has also led to a substantial reduction in fixed costs.

Achieving a 100% remote work environment for all employees was a benefit that exceeded our expectations. We even have staff based in Thailand handling Japan-related operations, enabling a working style free from constraints of time and location. This allowed us to shift from a regular employee-centric model to a highly flexible organizational structure cantered around contract workers with high commission rates, significantly improving our operational agility. Being able to sustain our business during an unpredictable crisis like the COVID-19 pandemic was undoubtedly thanks to PORTERS.

It all comes down to the fact that you can access and use it from anywhere in the world. Even when I am traveling between various countries, I can check the system to grasp the progress of each consultant in real-time. Our employees can also handle their tasks from home or overseas without needing to commute to an office. This flexibility, which is unique to cloud systems, is the very foundation supporting our current 100% remote work setup and our location- and time-independent employment model. It is also extremely helpful when coordinating with external accounting firms to process commission payments, as extracting the necessary data is incredibly smooth.

If you are still using paper documents to manage information, I highly recommend implementing a system and digitizing your data immediately. Not only does it allow you to become completely paperless, but it makes process management overwhelmingly easier. Moreover, the ability of recruiting agencies themselves to offer flexible working styles like fully remote work serves as a huge attraction when hiring excellent consultants. As acquiring talent becomes increasingly difficult, offering a free working style utilizing a cloud system will surely lead to strengthening your own company’s recruitment capabilities.

We believe the need for highly skilled foreign professionals will continue to grow in Japan. Therefore, utilizing the track record and database we have built up in Thailand and Taiwan, we will further accelerate our business of connecting excellent local talent with Japanese companies. There are still many Japanese companies that simply don’t know what to do or where to start when it comes to hiring foreign nationals. We plan to continue our educational activities to clearly convey the appeal and working styles of talent from Thailand and Taiwan to these companies, ultimately aiming to contribute to the revitalization of Japanese society.