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In some countries, the word “loyalty” is not necessarily regarded as a very high virtue as it is associated with hierarchy. But in Japan, the word is still regarded as one of the highest virtues.

Although the word “loyalty” is often used in corporate discussions, it is difficult to explain the common definition of loyalty as everybody uses the word based on one’s own perception.

The first question is “being loyal to whom?”. In the old days of feudalism, it was probably about being loyal to your Lord or Shogun or Emperor etc. In the modern days, it was about being loyal to the company. However, the company is just a legal entity. So in reality it means being loyal to some specific person or group of people in the company. To your boss, a great executive, teammates or subordinates etc. Another way to be loyal is to be loyal to one’s work, responsibility and integrity. Many people don’t just want to quit in a selfish-manner. They want to do a proper hand-over and leave in a responsible way. It shows in a way a kind of loyalty but not to someone but to one’s own work. Some people can be loyal to a certain brand or product. In this way, you become loyal customers.

Whether you are loyal to someone in the company or to one’s own work, as long as the person has a reason to stay in the company, we consider it as loyalty. The simplest way to explain loyalty would be “the reason why you stay in the company”.

We have to be careful that there are two types of loyalty; sound loyalty vs fear-driven loyalty. As long as the sense of loyalty is coming voluntarily and spontaneously from inside of the person, it is sound loyalty. However, if it is just a product of fear and worries of the consequence of not obeying someone or not doing something, it is fear-driven loyalty which is probably not loyalty any more. It is just pressure and coercion.

There are also two different natures of loyalty. One is materialistic. The materialistic nature of loyalty is pretty much defined by the give-and-take mutual expectations. Companies expect employees to work for many years, work long hours, obey the boss and go to any location as instructed. In return, employees expect companies to pay a decent salary and retirement allowance, provide job security and a steady career path upward with regular promotions and salary raise. Given the current social situation in Japan where companies can not offer job security anymore and many digital native young people don’t want to be (and can not survive) just as corporate employees any more, this materialistic nature of loyalty is very difficult to be maintained.

The other nature of loyalty is humanistic. Employees want to contribute to the people they work with by doing what they are good at. They want to give back to the world which gave them a lot of things. In the same manner, companies (i.e. executives and top mgmt. teams) want to provide a healthy work environment and great corporate culture so that they can also give back to the hard working employees who are the core of their companies. The humanistic nature of loyalty is driven by people’s sense of loyalty to humanity. We feel like giving what is good in ourselves to make the world a better place. This loyalty to humanity, instead of to one’s own company or country alone, will lead us to greater efforts on corporate ethics, sustainability and world peace and prosperity.

So when we talk about loyalty, it should not be measured only by the length of years in the same company. Loyalty to humanity should be regarded as a more constructive measure of loyalty as it shows in constructive behaviors of both management members and employees. Such behaviors include; honestly saying what needs to be said, treating everyone as a person regardless of the status, disagreeing in private without criticizing someone in public, telling others when you want to leave before suddenly submitting a resignation letter etc.