Rank Up Wins Grand Prize in the Career Transformation Category at the Career Ownership Management AWARD 2026

Rank Up Co., Ltd. (Head office: Chuo-ku, Tokyo; Representative Director: Yumiko Iwasaki) has won the Grand Prize in the Career Transformation Category for small and medium-sized enterprises at the Career Ownership Management AWARD 2026, operated by Persol Career Co., Ltd. as the executive committee. The award recognized Rank Up’s integrated initiatives built around the idea of starting from “one person’s concern.” The company has developed three measures combining shared values, workplace visibility, and life-stage support to increase the number of employees who exercise career ownership, while balancing individual autonomous growth with enhanced corporate value. Under its “visualize” initiative, the company makes employees’ aspirations, life stages, and workload visible through career intention interviews every three months, visualization of overtime hours by team and individual, and company-wide workshops every six months to share values and survey results. Under its “increase” initiative, Rank Up creates an environment where employees do not have to give up their careers because of life-stage changes. Measures include fully company-paid sick-child sitter costs, flexible systems such as hybrid work, shorter hours, staggered working hours and hourly paid leave, as well as “childcare experience” programs to deepen mutual understanding. Under its “connect” initiative, the company links challenges that begin with individual concerns to actual businesses and internal systems. Examples include the development of Acunal, a skincare brand born from an employee who struggled with acne for more than 10 years; the founding of Craver Kids, an after-school-style program inspired by concerns shared by the vice president’s family and employees’ own experiences; and daily company-wide sharing of customer feedback, followed by immediate improvements through meetings focused on resolving dissatisfaction and inconvenience. The results are visible in the company’s culture. In employee surveys conducted from 2013 to 2017, the score for employee participation in decision-making rose from 11% to 79%, work fulfillment rose from 47% to 93%, and the share of employees who looked forward to coming to work rose from 0% to 57%. The company has shifted from a strongly top-down “dark period” to an autonomous, co-creative corporate culture. In work style and career development, about 80% of the roughly 100 employees are women, and about 40% are working mothers raising children. The return-to-work rate after maternity and childcare leave is 100%, and resignations mainly due to childcare have been kept at nearly zero. The idea of not giving up either work or childcare has taken root as a real corporate culture, not just a slogan. In corporate value, Rank Up’s revenue grew to about 14.4 billion yen for the fiscal year ended September 2025. The company operates with two main business pillars: cosmetics and education. Businesses originating from the workplace have contributed to portfolio diversification and sustained improvement in corporate value. Rank Up’s approach to career ownership management is rooted in founder Yumiko Iwasaki’s own experience of being forced at a so-called exploitative company to choose between marriage and childbirth or a career. Since founding Rank Up, she has advocated a work style that does not assume overtime. The company later identified the deeper issue as employees’ lack of a sense of participation in decision-making. What Rank Up has built is not merely a set of systems, but an organizational culture in which employees can proactively exercise career ownership. Employee-led challenges have become real brands and businesses. Acunal was created from a challenge initiated by employee Haruka Sasaki, who struggled with acne for more than 10 years. After about three and a half years of research and trial and error, the brand was completed and has received many comments from customers with similar concerns saying they have come to like their own skin. Craver Kids was born from concerns shared by the vice president’s family and employees’ original experiences, based on the question of how to nurture the ability to think independently and express opinions in the AI era. It has built a curriculum designed to foster the habit of enjoying the unknown. Through the experience of turning challenges rooted in personal concerns into businesses, employees come to see their careers as their own responsibility. Rather than giving up their careers due to life-stage changes, they are nurtured into people who grow autonomously. Representative Director Yumiko Iwasaki commented: “We are sincerely grateful to receive the Grand Prize in the Career Transformation Category at the Career Ownership Management AWARD 2026. What we have valued is not simply preparing systems, but building an organizational culture in which employees can proactively exercise career ownership. We have realized a state where challenges from the workplace are successively turned into businesses, such as an employee who struggled with acne launching a brand and a new education business being born from parent-child concerns. ‘Do not give up career advancement after becoming a mother’ and ‘Do not give up either work or childcare’ are no longer ideals at our company; they have become the norm. Going forward, by continuing to support challenges launched proactively by employees, we aim to balance the development of people who exercise career ownership with our growth as a company that solves concerns.” As a future initiative, Rank Up began monthly 15-minute one-on-one meetings between all employees and their supervisors in November 2025. The purpose is to create opportunities where employees can safely talk about non-work matters such as physical condition or concerns, and to detect small mental health changes early. Rather than being a simple forum for reporting, communicating, and consulting, the meetings are designed as a place where supervisors focus on listening and subordinates speak proactively. The company plans to use this as a new initiative to prevent isolation and poor health while further supporting career ownership. The Career Ownership Management AWARD 2026 honors companies that practice career ownership management to achieve sustainable growth for both individuals and organizations, and aims to spread those initiatives throughout society. In fiscal 2026, 68 companies and organizations were selected for recognition from among 2,777 applicants. Rank Up was selected for the Grand Prize in the Career Transformation Category for small and medium-sized enterprises. Rank Up Co., Ltd. was established on June 10, 2005, with capital of 10 million yen. It had 113 employees as of November 2025 and revenue of 14.4 billion yen for the fiscal year ended September 2025. Its head office is located at Hulic Ginza 3-chome Building 7F, 3-10-7 Ginza, Chuo-ku, Tokyo. Its businesses include the development and sale of original brands Manara, R Hom, and Acunal, as well as the operation of the private after-school-style program Craver Kids.