追(お)い出(だ)し部屋(べや)

おいだしべや
noun
banishment room (for employees a company wants to leave)
informalworksociety
1. banishment room; a department where unwanted employees are placed
A section, often with a bland official name, where a company puts employees it wants to leave, giving them little or menial work so that they resign "voluntarily."
追(お)い出(だ)し部屋(べや)に異動(いどう)させられた。
I was transferred to a "banishment room."
追(お)い出(だ)し部屋(べや)では仕事(しごと)が与(あた)えられない。
In the banishment room, you're given no real work.
大手(おおて)メーカーの追(お)い出(だ)し部屋(べや)が報道(ほうどう)され、社会問題(しゃかいもんだい)になった。
News reports about a major manufacturer's banishment room turned the practice into a social issue.

A media term that spread in the early 2010s, when newspapers reported such departments at large electronics makers. Because dismissing regular employees is legally difficult in Japan, pressure to resign takes this indirect form.

Similar words

  • 窓際族(まどぎわぞく): the sidelined employees themselves; an older and milder word
  • 肩(かた)たたき: a tap on the shoulder — being nudged toward early retirement
  • 退職勧奨(たいしょくかんしょう): the formal term for encouraging someone to resign