From its earliest days as a fintech startup, PayPay set its sights on global expansion. For PayPay’s leaders, it was an exhilarating yet stressful time. As the organization grew super-fast, tons of management challenges emerged. HR in particular was struggling to keep up with the talent demands of a rapidly expanding workforce. “We needed to make fast, strategic people decisions,” says HR Director, Yuichi Hagiwara. “But our HR data was scattered, with different levels of detail and definitions. It was hard to get a real-time view of anything.”
PayPay decided to implement a flexible human capital management solution that could scale up to support its long-term growth strategy, "From the beginning, our goal was to adopt the world’s leading HR solution,” says CIO, Hiroshi Okada. “Most global big tech companies, as well as the majority of S&P 500 firms, were using Workday. Its global-standard processes and data-driven approach were a perfect fit for PayPay.”
Data drives decision-making confidence.
Now, PayPay’s HR organization can easily access reliable information through meaningful dashboards, and people decisions are made with speed and confidence. Guesswork has been replaced with evidence-based insights. “Both management and the teams on the ground can make quicker, smarter decisions based on real data,” explains Hagiwara.
He believes accurate people data is the foundation of any solid business strategy. “Without it, leaders risk inadvertently steering the business in the wrong direction.”
We’re driving the business forward based on data—not gut feeling or personal intuition.HR Director
Skills visibility powers strategic resourcing.
PayPay can now see the fine details of its talent landscape. “With this data, we can dynamically understand which skills exist, where they are, and in what quantity across the organization,” says Hagiwara. As a result, HR can quickly allocate the right people to high-priority projects, identify emerging capability gaps, and link those insights directly to recruitment strategies.
For a fast-scaling business, this type of agility is critical. “To keep moving forward, what matters most are speed and accuracy in decision-making,” says Hagiwara. “That means gathering information comprehensively – outside and inside the company.” By understanding talent data in real time and linking it instantly to management decisions, PayPay not only keeps up with change but stays one step ahead of it.
We see Workday not just as a system, but as a platform that enables true collaboration between people and technology.
HR Director
HR lays foundations for the AI era.
As PayPay adopts AI, Okada sees its people platform as a strategic enabler. “Anyone who can’t harness AI won’t have a place in the future,” he says. He views HR platforms through the same lens: “Products unable to integrate AI capabilities will gradually be phased out in the years to come.”
Okada says he looks to Workday as a model for how organizations can continuously refine products and services through AI and data-driven innovation, all the while maintaining a strong customer-first mindset. “From here on, I hope to see more Japanese companies and government agencies adopt global HR platforms like Workday.”
With Workday, we are building the kind of foundation that will be essential in the coming era of AI agents.
Chief Information Officer