Details
- Location: Preferably based in Japan. Candidates based in other countries with exceptional qualifications may be considered.
- Fee: USD 1,300 per month
- Working hours: 14 hours per week (2 days per week)
- Reports to: Japan Researcher & Representative
- Contract Type: 12 months with possible extension
- Closing Date: 15 April 2026, 11:59PM JST
To apply: Complete and return this application form via our jobs portal. Kindly note that the application form is required; we will not accept CVs. If you need any additional support, please reach out to Giulia Vinzi at [email protected]
About us:
Business & Human Rights Centre (BHRC) is a high-impact, global organisation headquartered in London, UK. We engage various stakeholders, including governments, businesses, and investors, to advance protection and respect for human rights in business and hold companies accountable for abuse. We do this by working in solidarity with human rights advocates in civil society, business and governments to support bold leadership for human rights in business and strengthened corporate accountability, due diligence, and effective remedy for abuse. We also build transparency of advances, challenges, and abuse of human rights in business. We generate and share information that is relevant, reliable and up to date, and we work with advocates around the world to use this information to drive positive change that puts human rights at the heart of business.
The Position:
The Research Assistant will support the global team to advance human rights in business and work towards eradicating abuse. The Research Assistant will work closely with our Japan Researcher, seeking to support civil society to encourage and press Japanese companies to improve human rights performance and engage Japanese companies to help advance their human rights policy and performance, both domestically and overseas, by:
- Building Transparency: Collecting & publicising information from a wide range of sources on our multilingual website (available in 11 languages, including Japanese) and in our Weekly Update and Japanese newsletters, to bring attention to concerns related to social & environmental impacts as well as positive steps by businesses. Communicating on issues related to business’ responsibility on social and environmental issues in the region through contribution to blog posts, media articles, and briefing notes.
- Promoting accountability: Seeking public responses from companies to concerns of misconduct. The BHRC has approached companies over 10,000 times for responses to allegations.
- Empowering advocates: By ensuring that organisations, companies, and governments throughout the region are aware of how to use the BHRC to obtain the information and guidance they need, and to channel their concerns to an influential audience. This will be achieved through effective representation, online and in-person networking.
Responsibilities:
Specifically, the Assistant will:
- Conduct online research to identify reporting on Japanese companies’ social and environmental impacts both domestically and overseas. Present the information on the BHRC’s website in a compelling format for users. When necessary, translate information between English and Japanese.
- Invite companies to respond to concerns raised by civil society about their conducts. This involves an initial approach by email and fax, and often extensive follow-up via phone as well as email with relevant representatives of the company.
- Provide assistance in writing materials in Japanese or English for the BHRC’s website and external outreach, such as newsletters, blog posts, briefing notes, or articles.
- Provide assistance to Japan Researcher in hosting webinars/events including monthly online briefing sessions and topic-specific webinars targeting our Japanese audience, aimed at facilitating engagements and dissemination of materials relevant to business and human rights in Japan; assist organising and coordinating logistics for events with CSOs, unions, and community groups for policy dialogues.
- Participate in Global Team projects as needed, and in one-hour online meetings with the BHRC’s Global Team, every two weeks.
- Additional Tasks: You may also be asked to assist the Centre with general support to contribute to achieving our organisational mission, such as supporting or liaising with relevant organisations and stakeholders, attending events and conferences, etc.
Key competencies and attributes
- Values: Strong, demonstrated commitment to human rights. Shares values and ethos of the BHRC.
- Experience and Education: 1-3+ years’ work in the field of business and human rights, corporate social responsibility, labour rights, development, environment or social justice (preferably working on Japan) is preferred. Applicants without such experience will also be considered, but must demonstrate good understandings and proven interest in business and human rights and other social issues in general.
- Research and analytical skills: Able to search and identify relevant information online; persistent in seeking out difficult-to-find information; creative in identifying new sources of information.
- Communications: Strong writing skills, including succinct writing for the website.
- Team-work: Able to operate effectively and constructively as part of a global team, and ensure smooth communication despite geographical distances between team members.
- Self-initiative and motivation: Able to use own initiative, and work independently within agreed framework and in a remote setting; motivated by achieving results and completing tasks.
- Organisation and prioritisation: Strong organisational and prioritisation skills, enabling efficient and effective work.
Requirements:
- 1-3+ years’ work in the field as laid out above
- A Bachelor’s or Master’s degree, regardless of disciplines will be considered.
- Fluency in Japanese and strong English-language skills (reading, writing, speaking).
- Commitment to advancing social and environmental commitment from the business sector.
- The right to work in Japan (applicants from other locations will also be considered, but priorities will be given to those based in Japan)
Terms and conditions
Note that this is a part-time consultancy position. Payment will be made on the Research Assistant’s presentation of a monthly invoice. The Research Assistant will be responsible for paying from the fees his/her/their own taxes, health insurance, pension, etc, and those costs are taken into account in calculating the fees. The BHRC will reimburse necessary work-related expenses such as for travel.
Hours: The Research Assistant is expected to work 2 days (14 hours) per week. The hours worked are flexible, provided that there is effective communication with the Japan Researcher primarily, as well as other team members in other regions, and that the hours are spread reasonably throughout a week.
The Research Assistant will have the freedom to organise paid days off from doing consulting work for the BHRC, in an amount expected to be 9.6 days during the year (67.2 hours – i.e., equivalent to 24 days per year for full-time work). The Research Assistant will not be expected to work on local holidays.