Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

For $450, a Japanese Company Will Quit Your Job for You

npr.org

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

21–30 of 121 posts

Re: For $450, a Japanese Company Will Quit Your Job for You

#21

Post by sametmax »

toomanybeersies wrote: post #6

I don't know why, but I found it really hard to resign at my old job. I actively disliked it and I didn't owe them anything. But still I found it really hard to resign and tell my colleagues that I was resigning, I didn't even care about them. Most of the team only learned that I was leaving on my last week (I had given 3 weeks notice). I just felt really awkward telling them for some unknown reason. Funnily enough,…

It's because of the way our brain deals with commitment: the more your invest yourself in something, the harder it is to quit.

E.G:

Put your bad next to a person and leave. A thief comes and steal the bag. You have a low change of the person to protect your bag.

Do the same, but just ask quickly if the person can keep an eye on the bag. You now have a much higher change that the person will protect it. The risks are the same for the person, and the gains are still zero, but they committed.

This have plenty of application in sales, politics, etc.

For a very fun ride about this, read "Small Treatise About Manipulation for Honest People ". It explains very well how we trick ourselves into taking weird decisions because of commitments.

Re: For $450, a Japanese Company Will Quit Your Job for You

#22

Post by andruby »

sofon wrote: post #18
tinco wrote: post #17

Resigning seems hard, but it's a little bit like giving regular feedback in my opinion. First of all it's best done face to face, because you don't want to be misunderstood, and you want to give the other party a fair chance at replying. Second, you give the compliment sandwich. You start out with thanking them for the opportunity (any job is an opportunity, no matter how shitty it was, you made money and you learned…

I think like most "weird Japan" articles this one is being mischaracterised somewhat. It is often somewhat difficult in Japan to get your legal entitlement when leaving a so called "black" company. They might not easily pay out your remaining holiday, or they might use "power harassment" to otherwise make your exit process difficult. So I can see that a company like this, while not providing legal services, removes t…

What are these so-called "black" companies? It sounds intriguing.

Re: For $450, a Japanese Company Will Quit Your Job for You

#23

Post by Arnavion »

andruby wrote: post #22
sofon wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think like most "weird Japan" articles this one is being mischaracterised somewhat. It is often somewhat difficult in Japan to get your legal entitlement when leaving a so called "black" company. They might not easily pay out your remaining holiday, or they might use "power harassment" to otherwise make your exit process difficult. So I can see that a company like this, while not providing legal services, removes t…

What are these so-called "black" companies? It sounds intriguing.

White-colloar sweatshops.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Black_company_(Japanese_term)

Re: For $450, a Japanese Company Will Quit Your Job for You

#25

Post by wolfgke »

tokyodude wrote: post #13

I'm sure this is similar in other cultures but Japan still has a strong attitude that you're lucky to have a job. Contrast that to us (myself included) spoiled Silicon Valley type engineer who gets job offers often and companies trying to entice us with free food, game rooms, etc... From that, people who have a job in Japan often feel obligated as in "You gave my a job and made it possible to live my life. You invest…

> I'm sure this is similar in other cultures but Japan still has a strong attitude that you're lucky to have a job. Contrast that to us (myself included) spoiled Silicon Valley type engineer who gets job offers often and companies trying to entice us with free food, game rooms, etc...

[...]

> The longer I'm in Japan the more I'm mellowing on some of my western and spoiled engineer attitudes.

Could this all plausibly be explained simply by buyer's market vs sellers's market for the respective jobs? I mean: if there exist far less good programmers than demand for them on the market, employees will easily become entitled (side story: for example in Germany, the job market for programmers is very different from what I read about the situation in the Silicon Valley on HN). On the other hand, if employers have lots of potential employees to choose from, the power dynamics is entirely different.

Re: For $450, a Japanese Company Will Quit Your Job for You

#26

Post by jpatokal »

Arnavion wrote: post #23
andruby wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What are these so-called "black" companies? It sounds intriguing.

White-colloar sweatshops. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Black_company_(Japanese_term)

Not necessarily white-collar: for example, restaurant chain Watami is somewhat notorious for (literally!) working their staff to death.

Re: For $450, a Japanese Company Will Quit Your Job for You

#27

Post by jpatokal »

tokyodude wrote: post #13

I'm sure this is similar in other cultures but Japan still has a strong attitude that you're lucky to have a job. Contrast that to us (myself included) spoiled Silicon Valley type engineer who gets job offers often and companies trying to entice us with free food, game rooms, etc... From that, people who have a job in Japan often feel obligated as in "You gave my a job and made it possible to live my life. You invest…

Well, there's also the fact that traditionally, if you quit a seishain (full time) job in Japan, you're seen as damaged goods (why else would you quit/be forced by your company to quit?) and it's exceedingly unlikely that another company would want to hire you. Obviously this is no longer true in the IT sphere, but in other industries this remains more or less the norm.

Re: For $450, a Japanese Company Will Quit Your Job for You

#28

Post by lx3459683 »

tokyodude wrote: post #13

I'm sure this is similar in other cultures but Japan still has a strong attitude that you're lucky to have a job. Contrast that to us (myself included) spoiled Silicon Valley type engineer who gets job offers often and companies trying to entice us with free food, game rooms, etc... From that, people who have a job in Japan often feel obligated as in "You gave my a job and made it possible to live my life. You invest…

> I knew a person who wanted to quit, their boss said "no, you can't quit", and they stayed on for several more months

[...]

> I feel like the it's "me vs them" attitude I see so much on HN leads to worse outcomes

I think your anecdote there proves otherwise. That person was asked to act against their own interest and did it out of feebleness. They didn't gain anything in return, it was not a equitable exchange where e.g the boss paid out an additional bonus for the employee continuing to stay against their wish.

In a capitalist society, it is always workers vs employers. Do not mistake Japan's social cohesion for some kind of workplace utopia. It is one of the worst countries on earth in terms of work life balance - which is currently destroying their entire society as childbirth rates plummet. This is not hyperbole. By 2030 years ~85% of the population will be elderly people.

Re: For $450, a Japanese Company Will Quit Your Job for You

#29

Post by ekianjo »

I have quit jobs several times in Japan and while quitting was not difficult in itself, I did not like one bit the fact that resignations are almost kept secret to most employees. Like some of my more distant colleagues noticed weeks after I left that I was not in the office anymore and found out by asking around that I resigned. Always amazes me.
Post reply on HN