CORPORATE IKIGAI TRAINING
YOUR TEAM'S WELLBEING IS WORTH INVESTING IN
If your customers matter, then your employees’ wellbeing should matter just as much. In today’s fast-paced world, many employees are on the edge of burnout. When you take care of them, they’ll take care of your business.
Enhance your team’s wellbeing, engagement, and performance with Ikigai Tribe’s Corporate Wellness Programs—tailored solutions designed to fit your goals and budget.
Ikigai as Workplace Wellbeing
Ikigai is not a Western productivity hack. It is a deeply human concept that should be understood in the context of positive psychology. In Japan, ikigai is often described as a measure of well-being. Research shows that it is strongly associated with:
- Emotional fulfilment and well-being
- Growth and future orientation
- Contribution and meaning
As a leader, employer, or HR manager, your role is not to “give” your employees ikigai. Ikigai is multi-dimensional, subjective, and personal. Your responsibility is to create the conditions, culture, and belief in a positive future so that your staff can experience their work and roles as sources of ikigai.
OUR SERVICES
IKIGAI COACH TRAINING
Equip your organisation with an in-house Ikigai specialist. Whether it’s a team leader, HR manager, or dedicated coach, we provide certification through our Ikigai Tribe Coach program - an authentic, evidence-based approach to purpose and well-being.
IKIGAI WORKSHOPS
Interactive workshops designed to engage your team in the authentic Japanese concept of ikigai. These sessions spark reflection, build connection, and explore how aligning values and roles can increase engagement, resilience, and workplace satisfaction.
CORPORATE RETREATS
Intimate, small-group retreats in Japan for leaders seeking clarity on mission and roles. Step outside daily pressures into a reflective environment that fosters alignment, vision, and the personal growth needed to lead with authenticity and purpose.
TAILORED CORPORATE PROGRAMS
Sustainable transformation doesn’t happen in a single session. Our multi-month corporate programmes are designed to embed the authentic Japanese concept of ikigai into the culture of your organisation. We work with you to design a tailored journey that blends workshops, individual and group coaching, and digital learning resources, ensuring that the ideas introduced don’t just inspire for a day, but create lasting change.
Delivered as corporate training contracts, these programmes can be scaled to different levels of your organisation—from leadership teams to department groups—building alignment, strengthening roles, and cultivating a shared sense of purpose. By moving beyond one-off workshops, your organisation invests in a framework that enhances engagement, retention, resilience, and workplace well-being over the long term.
DON'T BE FOOLED!
Ikigai is Japan’s most misunderstood word, and it is increasingly being misrepresented in corporate and leadership training.
If you have attended—or are considering—an “ikigai” corporate or leadership program that presents it as the sweet spot of a Venn diagram, or reduces it exclusively to the idea of purpose, then you have been misinformed.
While the Venn diagram framework may appear inspiring—or perhaps more accurately, seductive—it does not help your team genuinely experience ikigai at work. Instead, it oversimplifies the concept, sets unrealistic expectations, and risks reducing ikigai to a cliché rather than the rich, evidence-based, life-affirming concept we can relate to positive psychology.
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BRING JAPANESE WISDOM INTO YOUR WORKPLACE
IBASHO: CREATING A PLACE TO BE
For this to happen, your workplace must function as an ibasho – a psychological space or environment where people can be themselves while working to the best of their abilities, pursing purpose and growing.
In such a space, employees:
- Have agency in how they work.
- Feel a genuine sense of purpose.
- Can communicate freely without fear.
- Know they can be authentic in their roles.
Ibasho is a sub-theory of ikigai and a recognized psychological concept in Japan, defined by three factors:
- A sense of role
- A sense of relief
- A sense of authenticity
In the workplace, this translates into tangible occupational factors: valuation of work, sense that the job is worth doing, expectation for growth, adaptability, personal support, and human connection.
The critical question for you as a leader is: Are you providing these conditions for your employees?
ROLEFULNESS
Beyond ibasho, another key sub-theory is rolefulness, a concept coined and researched by Professor Daiki Kato of Kinjo Gakuin University, where he specializes in clinical psychology and art therapy.
While ikigai reflects a person’s overall sense of life worth living, rolefulness emphasizes the psychological fulfilment that comes from engaging in and embracing social roles. Kato’s research shows that when people can clearly recognize and find meaning in their roles, they experience greater well-being, belonging, and resilience.
Employees do not find meaning only in tasks—they find it in the roles they embody: as team members, mentors, innovators, problem-solvers, or leaders. When employees can clearly recognize and embrace their roles, they experience:
- A stronger sense of belonging.
- Increased clarity about contribution.
- Emotional satisfaction from being “needed.”
- Greater resilience when navigating challenges.
For organizations, cultivating rolefulness means ensuring that roles are not ambiguous, overloaded, or devalued. Instead, they should be clearly defined, aligned with personal strengths, and recognized as meaningful to the whole.
When rolefulness is fostered, your workplace becomes more than a place of employment—it becomes a community where people thrive through the identities they inhabit.
KOKOROZASHI: A SHARED MISSION
For leaders, there is kokorozashi, a uniquely Japanese concept often translated as “aspiration of the heart.” In today’s context—and as taught at Japan’s leading business school—it is understood as the leader’s mind, the inner will to shape a meaningful future and contribute to society.
Kokorozashi goes beyond corporate vision statements or KPIs. It is the deeply personal yet collective mission that drives a lasting impact on society. For a company, kokorozashi serves as both a moral compass and a declaration of the contribution it strives to make in the world.
For leaders, the critical questions are:
- What impact does your company want to have on society?
- Is this mission understood, shared, and embraced by your staff and stakeholders?
When kokorozashi is clear and alive within an organization, it binds people together, fuels motivation, and ensures that work is not only profitable but deeply meaningful.
BRINGING IKIGAI INTO THE WORKPLACE
In short, do you want to:
- Have employees who feel safe, supported, and authentic (ibasho).
- Ensure their roles are fulfilling, recognized, and valued (rolefulness).
- Build a company mission that is shared and impactful (kokorozashi).
If you want to embed ikigai and its sub-theories—ibasho, rolefulness, and kokorozashi—into your workplace, then reach out.
We provide training in all these areas, or you can sponsor one of your employees, your HR manager, or a team leader to become a Certified Ikigai Tribe Coach.
If you are ready to explore this approach, fill in the contact form below and let’s discuss how corporate ikigai can reshape your workplace.