AI-Powered Smiles: How Japan's AEON Supermarket Rates Employee Cheerfulness

Home AI News AI-Powered Smiles: How Japan's AEON Supermarket Rates Employee Cheerfulness

Updated on November 13 2024

According to a report from the South China Morning Post, Japan's Aeon supermarket chain has started implementing an artificial intelligence (AI) system in approximately 240 stores nationwide since July. This groundbreaking initiative aims to evaluate employees' smiles and tone of voice during customer interactions to enhance service quality. The system, known as "Smile-kun," assesses over 450 facial expression data points, scoring the degree of smiles in both the eyes and mouth across 100 stages.

In addition to assessment, "Smile-kun" features interactive training games that allow employees to accumulate experience points and level up, with increasing difficulty as their skills improve. This gamified approach helps workers practice their smiling and vocal techniques in a supportive environment. Furthermore, the system records individual performance data, enabling comparisons across different stores and regularly recognizing top performers.

Despite its potential to improve service, the introduction of this system has raised concerns about workplace harassment. In Japan, customer harassment is viewed as a significant issue, with a study by the largest union, UA Zensen, revealing that nearly half of surveyed employees have experienced such behavior. While the AI system's goal is to uplift service standards, Japanese companies must navigate the challenge of achieving this without compromising employee morale.

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