KEY POINTSBellSystem24 survey finds 78.6% of managers at Japanese companies with 30 or more employees report labor shortagesManagers spend about two hours per employee daily on duplicate entry, paper processing and meeting materials targeted for digitalizationGenerative AI adoption reaches 33.7% overall and 55.9% at companies with 5,000 or more employees
Managers at Japanese companies spend about two hours a day on office tasks targeted for AI. Generative AI adoption rises to 55.9% at the largest firms. Photo by Jakub Żerdzicki on Unsplash
Jakub Żerdzicki
BellSystem24 Holdings on August 17 released the results of a survey on workplace efficiency, showing that managers at Japanese companies spend about two hours per employee each day on administrative tasks they want to eliminate through AI or digitalization.
The survey, titled “Survey on Workplace Efficiency,” covered 542 managers working at private-sector companies with 30 or more employees, ranging from small and midsized businesses to companies with more than 5,000 employees. It was conducted on February 17-18, according to the release.
The company said 78.6% of respondents felt their organizations were facing labor shortages, with that view shared by just under 80% of companies regardless of size. The findings point to continued pressure on companies in Japan, where businesses have been adopting automation tools to address a shrinking labor pool.
Among office tasks respondents most wanted to remove through AI or digitalization, duplicate data entry and transcription ranked first at 35.8%, followed by paper-based document work such as printing, stamping, circulation, scanning and mailing at 32.3%. Preparing materials for meetings was cited by 31.7%.
Generative AI adoption stood at 33.7% overall, with penetration rising alongside company size. Adoption was 17.2% at companies with 30 to 99 employees, 33.0% at companies with 300 to 999 employees, and 55.9% at companies with 5,000 or more employees.
The main obstacles to producing results with AI were not the AI tools themselves, but earlier-stage operational issues. The top challenge was the burden of data input and preparation, cited by 37.7% of respondents, followed by a lack of standardized business processes at 30.2%.
The release also showed that 48.0% of respondents said major business processes had been standardized at their companies. The rate was 34.0% at companies with 30 to 99 employees, 51.6% at companies with 100 to 299 employees, 46.5% at companies with 1,000 to 4,999 employees, and 55.1% at companies with 5,000 or more employees.
BellSystem24 said the survey suggests companies need to standardize business processes before introducing AI and digital tools in order to maximize the benefits of those systems.
BellSystem24 began Japan’s first full-scale call center service in 1982. The group provides customer contact and business process outsourcing services.