Japanese company offers paid leaves to employees grieving over retirement, marriage of idols

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A Japanese company is offering paid leaves to employees to mourn or celebrate the marriage, retirement or graduation of their idols.

Hiroro Inc., a Tokyo-based creative direction company, is giving its otaku employees at most 10 paid leaves for the said reasons, as per Sora News 24 on March 16.

Hiroro’s president and founder, Shizen Tsurumi, announced the new company policy on Twitter, where it has gained over 50,000 likes and around 18,000 retweets since its posting on March 8.

社員の推しの卒業が決まってしまったため、弊社の勤務規定に慶弔休暇の項目が追加されました。 pic.twitter.com/s8owdfcSOn

— itaru9（株式会社ひろろ社長） (@itaru9Z) March 8, 2021

The new policy recognizes that the mental and emotional health of employees is just as important as their physical health, according to the report.

Tsurumi shared that he came up with it because of two events; first, when a usually competent employee became unfocused and uncooperative, the report said. It turns out that she was a fan of voice actress Nana Mizuki, who announced last summer that she is getting married.

In the other incident, Tsurumi noticed that another employee was sad after his favorite idol announced that she would be retiring soon. Tsurumi then told the employee to take the day off and sort his feelings out.

The Hiroro president then made this a company-wide policy titled the Oshi Vacation Policy, with Oshi being a term used in the idol community as a fan’s favorite idol, according to the report.

The policy states that employees can take 10 paid vacation leaves if their favorite idol is retiring, and up to three days off for a “lower-ranked” idol.

Aside from the said reasons, the Oshi Vacation Policy also makes it easier for employees to file for leaves when they want to attend a concert or meet-and-greet events of their idols. Ian Biong /ra

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