With purpose, innovating the Daiichi Life brand to discover worlds that were unseen yesterday.

Kaori Sakamoto is responsible for instilling Daiichi Life Group’s philosophy, revamped in 2024, and for the brand strategy of “Daiichi Life,” the Group’s new brand. Having returned to the Group after working in other industries, she shares her thoughts on spreading understanding of the Group’s philosophy, nurturing the new brand, and her unique career path.

During my job search, I developed a strong desire to join Daiichi Life Group. Every employee I met engaged in thoughtful conversations with me, and I sensed that this was an outstanding company with an open and flat organizational structure. I remember feeling incredibly happy when I received the job offer. This coincided with the opening of the new headquarters in Hibiya, leaving me with a feeling of bright optimism.

Upon joining the company, I was assigned to the then-Loan Operations Department, which was responsible for managing lending activities. At the time, loans constituted a significant portion of the company’s assets under management. While I felt a sense of responsibility for being entrusted with such important work, I lacked a background in economics or finance, so I studied diligently.

I joined the company just after the bubble burst. It was a time when the Japanese economy was rapidly deteriorating and non-performing loans were increasing. I felt uncertain about the future and was gripped by anxiety. At the same time, I had an inferiority complex that made me wonder if my performance was poor compared to my talented mentors and colleagues. I liked Daiichi Life as a company, and my colleagues patiently shared work methods and financial knowledge with me. Still, I could not shake the feeling that I was just not cut out for it. So, eventually, I left the company. Looking back now, I realize that my perspective was still very narrow, and that I quit without seeing the full picture.

After leaving the company, I worked in public relations, investor relations, sustainability, and branding at Benesse Holdings and Muji—companies in industries very different from Daiichi Life’s. What struck me most after leaving was how the work methodologies and financial knowledge I had acquired at Daiichi Life became the foundation of my career as a business professional. At Benesse Holdings, I honed my product planning and marketing skills within the children’s business division before transitioning to corporate departments such as corporate planning and public relations, where I worked for many years. Through these roles, I developed a deep passion for corporate communications, which I came to see as my core focus.

A company’s corporate philosophy is extremely important to me. For instance, both Benesse Holdings and Muji, where I worked in the past, are philosophy-driven companies, meaning they consistently base their decisions and actions on their core principles. As the communications lead, I devoted myself to ensuring that employees shared the corporate philosophy and could perform at their best. After experiencing major corporate crises, I came to believe that putting philosophy into practice is what builds a company’s brand. While working, I also conducted research at graduate school to demonstrate the relationship between corporate philosophy and brand. I wanted to continue working for a company whose philosophy resonated with me, and one day, I had the opportunity to rejoin Daiichi Life. This company uses the phrase “lifelong partner,” which employees have held very dear since the 1990s, when I first joined. I, too, had always remembered this phrase.

At first, I thought it was unthinkable that I could return after having left the company. On the other hand, I was one of the fans watching Daiichi Life from afar. I was amazed at how the company was proactively expanding overseas ahead of its competitors, and when it incorporated as a stock company, I thought, “Yes, that is Daiichi Life for you.” Also, while working in communications, I often used messages issued by Daiichi Life as benchmarks, as many of them resonated with me. I considered Daiichi Life a sincere, open, and cool company that I wanted to support.

Upon hearing that the Daiichi Life Group was considering revisiting its philosophy and brand, I could not resist the urge to take on that work. I felt a strong desire to dedicate myself fully to the task.

When I rejoined the company, I was honestly nervous, but everyone treated me neutrally and generously shared their knowledge and expertise. It reaffirmed my sense that this is an open-minded company that has developed its main business of life insurance through collaboration across many departments and with frequent personnel changes. I feel the company excels at co-creating with others and at embracing and utilizing new ideas.

What has changed over time is the company’s strong conviction that we must change ourselves. We have set the goal of becoming a global top-tier insurance group and achieving a market capitalization of 10 trillion yen by 2030. With an increase in mid-career hires, the backgrounds and expertise of employees and executives have become more diverse. The organization has also become flatter than before, enabling faster decision-making. I sensed a strong will and a healthy sense of urgency to expand our business domains and evolve as we pursue these ambitious goals.

I deeply value the principle that “we are all different, and we are all good,” inspired by Me, the Little Bird, and the Bell, a poem by Misuzu Kaneko. Daiichi Life Group has many employees with diverse expertise in life insurance and finance—skills that I do not possess. On the other hand, I want to contribute by leveraging my expertise working with philosophies, brands, and communications. I believe an organization grows stronger when people with different backgrounds, perspectives, and specialties each contribute their strengths toward a common goal. The role of a dedicated brand specialist was previously uncharted territory within the Group—a kind of “vacant space.” I sometimes think of myself as a “vacant space talent,” and I aim to cultivate new value for the Group from this very space.

Companies must coexist with emotional value alongside financial and economic value. Branding is the work of creating emotional value that moves people’s hearts. To do that, I feel it is crucial that we do work that first moves our own hearts.

Our Group Purpose—the reason for our existence in society—within our renewed philosophy is “Partnering with you to build a brighter and more secure future.” While Daiichi Life Group has always valued being close to our customers as a “lifelong partner,” the new Group Purpose embodies not only our commitment to maintaining proximity, but also to “opening the future” in each individual’s life.

As Group Chief Brand and Culture Officer, my role is to share our philosophy with all employees across the Group and build brand value based on that foundation. Philosophy and brand are not separate entities. Each employee acts with the aspiration to realize our corporate philosophy. As a result, the Daiichi Life brand resonates with and appeals to customers and other stakeholders at each point of contact, whether it be in sales activities, through our products and services, in community initiatives, or via social media posts. It is through the accumulation of these moments that brand value is created in the hearts of our stakeholders.

Our culture is integral to this process. By sharing our philosophy and vision while creating systems that encourage and celebrate new value and challenges, we aim to cultivate an environment where employees can fully express their diversity. We seek to foster a “Think Differently” culture where each person shares our principles and thinks independently about what they genuinely believe is for the best—approaching everything from scratch and putting it into practice. Every single action connects to our brand. We see it all as one continuous thread.

This is a project where the historic brand that is Daiichi Life evolves through its own initiative. We firmly believe that opening the next new phase is essential. Major transformation is a time when each employee’s scope for contribution expands, so we want to draw out everyone’s sense of excitement and the joy of taking on challenges.

My greatest motivation is “discovering worlds that were unseen yesterday.” In that sense, nurturing a new brand involves many challenges, but it allows both myself and my colleagues to explore new horizons. The process of shaping something that does not yet exist—piece by piece, through repeated dialogue with many people inside and outside the company—is an incredibly enjoyable journey.

In graduate school, I analyzed and researched whether brand value truly increases when a corporate philosophy resonates with employees and they act on that philosophy. Having shown that instilling this philosophy does indeed elevate brand value, I now approach my work with confidence. I genuinely feel that building the brand together with everyone while sharing our philosophy is my life’s work.

With the new Daiichi Life brand, we aim to continuously expand the value provided by the Group. We want this new brand to serve as a catalyst and source of energy, encouraging employees to boldly challenge new fields, experiment with fresh approaches to existing businesses, and foster a healthy sense of “playfulness” within the company. We aspire to cultivate this playfulness that drives us to take action confidently, both for our customers and society.

In my personal life, I cherish my time doing ikebana flower arrangement. In my ikebana community, there is an approach to working with flowers: “Rather than starting with a preconceived shape, arrange the flowers while conversing with them, so that each individual flower can look beautiful.” I feel the same way about people. Rather than forcing a preconceived vision of a team I want to build from the start, I want to engage with each person and each task through repeated dialogue. By valuing and shaping what we feel through that dialogue, I believe we can reach vistas we could not see before.