Femtech literacy makes a company stronger: a new angle on workplace wellness

Femtech literacy, or femteracy, joins Female and Literacy. It means knowledge and understanding of health issues specific to women. A woman's body is strongly affected by shifts in hormone balance, through menstruation, pregnancy and birth, and the menopause. Understanding that biology and caring for it properly is what femteracy comes down to.

In recent years femteracy has drawn attention as an important lens for management. Behind that lies the advance of women in society and the rising share of women among a company's staff. According to a survey by the Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry, health issues specific to women are said to cost society around 3.4 trillion yen a year.

Women's health issues have tended to be dismissed as personal matters. Now they are coming to be recognised as a management issue that feeds straight into productivity and sustained growth. Raising femteracy and facing health issues specific to women is not a benefit but a strategic investment in a company's competitiveness.

What health issues specific to women mean for a company

What effect do health issues specific to women have on a company?

The biggest is presenteeism: being at work but unable to perform as you normally would because of how you feel. Drops in performance through period pain, PMS or menopausal symptoms are held to cost as much as absence does.

Health issues specific to women also affect turnover. Many women still leave on pregnancy or childbirth, which means valuable people flowing out of the company. A workplace where health issues cannot be raised openly also lowers engagement among women staff and drains the energy of the whole organisation.

These are not issues for women alone. They are serious management issues that feed straight into productivity across the organisation, into company culture, and in the end into results.

What joining workplace wellness and femteracy does for you

Workplace wellness means thinking about staff health from a management point of view and acting on it strategically. It treats staff health as an investment rather than a cost. What does a company gain by bringing a femteracy lens into it?

The first thing to note is higher productivity. a survey by Mitsubishi UFJ Research and Consulting puts the cost to society of menstruation-related symptoms at around 680 billion yen a year, and notes that most of it comes from presenteeism, being at work but unable to perform fully. Responding properly to health issues specific to women makes it easier for each person to perform as they can, which lifts performance across the organisation.

It also helps with attracting and keeping people. A company that takes health issues seriously is more readily seen as one that values its people, and can strengthen its position in the hiring market, particularly with younger people and with women. Whether support exists has become one of the tests of whether good people can settle and stay.

What companies are doing

Let us look at companies raising femteracy and taking on women's health issues.

Kao Corporation has opened a women's health help desk for its women staff across the country, so they can consult an occupational physician easily by email. The environment, where sensitive matters such as fertility treatment and the menopause can be raised with confidence, is well regarded, and alongside information on the intranet and regular women's health seminars, it provides continuing support through each stage of life [Ministry of Health, Labour and Welfare, support site for the minds and bodies of working women].

Providing support for women's health as part of how the workplace works, rather than leaving it to the individual, builds an environment where people can settle and work with confidence for a long time. That in turn feeds straight into less presenteeism, better retention, and a stronger company brand.

Health support through femtech

Femtech joins Female and Technology, and means products and services that solve health issues specific to women through technology. What kinds of health support use femtech?

The first are health management and monitoring tools. Using period-tracking apps and temperature-measuring devices, women staff can see changes in how they feel and look after themselves properly. For the company, offering these tools as a benefit encourages greater health awareness among staff.

Next comes support for raising health literacy. Seminars on the basics of women's health and e-learning content are effective ways to deepen understanding among all staff, men included. Educational content that works for a diverse workforce, such as video with Japanese and English subtitles, matters more and more.

Support for access to healthcare is important too. Bringing in online consultations and medical advice services lets staff speak to a specialist easily. An environment where they can get medical support between tasks leads to earlier detection and earlier action, and helps keep people well over the long run.

What matters when introducing these femtech services is not stopping at handing over a tool, but pushing them alongside a rethink of organisational culture and ways of working. Only with both technology and human support does the real effect show.

A health support programme built on Yasai Yakuzen

Yasai Yakuzen is one concrete example of a health support programme. It combines the wisdom of yakuzen, grounded in Chinese medicine, with a practical way of eating built on everyday vegetables. Because it uses vegetables from any supermarket rather than special kampo ingredients, anyone can keep it up without strain.

The programme aims to head off and ease the state known as pre-illness, covering things like tiring easily, feeling the cold and losing concentration, through the power of food. It can also help with symptoms common among women, such as feeling the cold, constipation and PMS.

For companies it offers constitution checks for staff, a chat for questions about how they feel, and suggestions for eating better, along with a service that analyses and visualises health by team. Pairing data with better eating makes staff health visible and lets you offer the right support.

Building an organisation that raises femteracy

What does it take, organisationally, to raise femteracy and drive support for women's health? Here are the key points that emerge from companies getting it right.

The first is commitment from the top. A message from leadership, backed by action, is what shifts thinking across the organisation. Placing women's health issues among the company's management issues and saying so openly makes it far easier to win understanding and cooperation from staff.

Next, understanding across the whole company, men included, is essential. Health issues specific to women are not women's problems alone but issues for the whole organisation to take on. Without understanding from male managers and colleagues, however good the policy, little of it works in practice.

A way of reflecting the voices of the women themselves matters too. Holding health meetings for women staff makes it possible to work out what is genuinely needed. Understanding what people on the ground need is what lets you put effective support in place.

Nor should privacy be forgotten. Health issues include personal and sensitive matters, so information has to be handled with great care. Building an environment where people can speak up with confidence is the first step in any support.

Build an organisation around these points and femteracy rises steadily, producing a workplace where women can do their best work.

Towards Health and Productivity Management certification

Work to raise femteracy also feeds into Health and Productivity Management certification. The scheme certifies organisations that think about staff health from a management point of view and act on it strategically, and in 2025 companies that had introduced corporate femtech services were certified as well.

Certification brings a better company image, helps attract good people and raises health awareness among staff. In some cases it also brings incentives such as better lending terms from financial institutions and discounts on insurance premiums.

Certification calls for health issues to be made visible, for concrete improvement measures, and for a way of checking that they worked. Work to raise femteracy is an important part of meeting those requirements.

In summary: the future femteracy opens up

Raising femteracy and facing women's health issues is no longer a nice-to-have but a management strategy essential to a company's sustained growth. Health issues specific to women cost some 3.4 trillion yen a year, and responding to them properly feeds straight into productivity and attracting people.

Joining workplace wellness with femteracy goes beyond benefits and becomes a strategic investment in competitiveness. Using femtech, introducing concrete programmes such as Yasai Yakuzen, and building understanding across the organisation are the keys to getting the most from it.

Why not take the first step towards raising femteracy at your own company?

A workplace where women can do their best work as themselves should be a light on your company's future.