Message from the President Aug.2013

Now, I often hear talks that “In recent year, it is hard to do a business just by holding a license.”

Even today, occupations which has “master” or special skills in its title usually requires license or qualification. For example, getting license to become a medical doctor, a lawyer, or an accountant are very hard. But, in the decade ago, it was a era which we could enter a profession just by obtaining a license. But the above talks are saying that, now, it is hard to enter a profession just by obtaining a license. I think, possible main reason for this is, market is not expanding due to decrease of population. I also think that one factor is, as the speed for era and society change are accelerating, speed of the once acquired specialized knowledge, skills, technologies becoming obsolete are faster.

Currently, amendments to the Worker Dispatching Law are being studied by the Ministry of Health, Labour and Welfare. One issue they are discussing is that "if the classification of specialized work (without dispatch time limitation) is consistent with current labor market or not." In response to this discussion, Nippon Engineering Outsourcing Association, which Meitec is a member of, is claiming that “It is difficult to fixedly set definitions of specialized work since themselves change day to day as the society, economy, industries and markets change. Therefore, the regulations should be reconsidered according to the stability of the employment.”

Of course, profession called engineer is naturally required to have specialized knowledge, technology and skills. But, would the designing and development are the only work requires such specialty? It is not true. There are jobs, such as inspection, maintenances and procurements, which would requires high expertise surrounding the design and development. This claim is that we should also position these people to be the engineers.

A prerequisite for this claim is that work of professionals are to continue polishing the brand of their own for "I can do this," without depending on a formality of license.