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Working and Communicating with Japanese Engineers

tokyodev.com

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Re: Working and Communicating with Japanese Engineers

#41

Post by photios »

koito17 wrote: post #37
photios wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah. I'm not a native English speaker and I spent significant time and effort learning the damn language. It paid off. What's preventing Japanese engineers from doing the same?

> What's preventing Japanese engineers from doing the same? The fact they don't really need it in their life (or job). English is definitely necessary if you work service jobs in Tokyo (to deal with tourists), but not much anywhere else. Japanese is one of a handful of languages where one can complete a postdoc entirely within the language. Many languages are not like this. e.g. in the Phillipines, STEM subjects are…

> The fact they don't really need it in their life (or job). English is definitely necessary if you work service jobs in Tokyo (to deal with tourists), but not much anywhere else.

But the linked article seems to imply the opposite. I mean, working with an English PM sure sounds like the language is one of the job's core competencies.

Re: Working and Communicating with Japanese Engineers

#42

Post by birdsongs »

Nashooo wrote: post #33
birdsongs wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> and majority of the time you will not be working with native English speakers, usually people who speak multiple languages at all times, if you're only language you know is English you are the minority and people will have to work with you to understand. This is pretty much life anywhere outside of North America and the UK (or colonies). In Norway, I don't think a single coworker of mine is a native English speaker…

Would you mind sharing some info on how you found a tech job in Norway? I'm from another European country and looking for some first-hand knowledge on working in / moving to Norway.

Yeah, absolutely. I came from the US, so it was a bit harder than a Schengen move. Not sure if you qualify for that or need a skills visa like I did.

But essentially I applied, a lot on LinkedIn. This started early 2021. Took about 8 months to secure a role, I was at 5 YoE at the time, embedded systems / embedded Linux engineering, and I would say moderately good at my job, nothing spectacular. No FAANG.

Oslo was quite difficult, I wasn't able to secure a job there. They are also very keen on grades and transcripts, even though it had been a decade since I was in University. I had mediocre grades, which may have hurt.

But I applied all over Norway, and got a robotics job in a small town on the west coast. They sponsored my skills visa, got me here, and after a year I transferred to our Oslo branch. Once you're in the country it's massively easier to move around. Interview was standard and sane, most here have been. Recruiter/manager soft fit check, a few technical rounds, then team and upper management interviews. Be humble but confident in interviews, don't brag excessively, it's very much the opposite of the US in working culture (read about "Janteloven"). Pay was substantially lower but I am so happy with the quality of life here I couldn't care less.

UDI, the immigration department, is steady but slow. Everything just takes time. Lots of info here (follow to the "skilled worker" portal): https://www.udi.no/en/want-to-apply/work-immigration/

I knew no Norwegian when moving. Nearly all tech jobs are English hybrid enough you can get by. But I would highly, highly recommend learning the language. Socially (private life) and professionally it helps so much. And it's a bit rare to really learn it, so people are often impressed or happy you do speak it. It's difficult though for a few reasons, dialect variety, English fluency among Norwegians, etc. I would say it took me all of 4 years to get to the point I could converse mostly fine at speed with someone speaking in a native dialect. Reading is much easier, that came after a year or two.

This was kind of an info dump, let me know if you have any specific questions!

Tl;dr: use LinkedIn, apply, apply, apply, don't get disheartened / give up, and give it time.

Re: Working and Communicating with Japanese Engineers

#43

Post by cedws »

bythreads wrote: post #15

Worked for years in japan, beg to disagree. Love japanese and japan but their work culture is horrific - Japanese are inefficient and the veneer of looking to work "hard" is more important than the hard work itself. People often stay until ridiculously late just to show they "put in the effort" which is more important than outcome. Then again that happens in many other countries as well ...

Yeah. I lived in Tokyo for 6 months as a digital nomad (so still working for an overseas employer.) As much as I love Japan, after hearing what the work culture is like I became pretty sure I didn't want to move there permanently. Not only is it an extremely unmeritocratic environment, the pay for software engs is rubbish. As a foreigner you'll more than likely be treated like dirt and passed up on for promotions.

I think it's a shame because Japan is going through a massive tourism boom at the moment. There's surely a huge number of incredibly smart and talented people who would like to bring their skills in and help lift Japan out of its economic slumber. But Japan is still very closed off and shows no signs of wanting to modernise.

Re: Working and Communicating with Japanese Engineers

#45

Post by BobbyTables2 »

This article misses some significant cultural differences.

I worked with a talented older group in Japan for a while.

If on a call they said something would be “difficult”, that was their understated way of saying “never in a million years would we do that”.

They were also strongly hierarchical and would often defer to their leader to avoid any disagreement.

They could teach the British a lesson in understatement…

Even though we had a close working relationship they were very much trying to “save face” when issues came up and didn’t directly admit shortcomings.

Also, never address them by their first names !!

Re: Working and Communicating with Japanese Engineers

#47

Post by navane »

onion2k wrote: post #22
sunray2 wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sounds really nice! Do you have an example of the concise, high quality communciation the Japanese team used? It'd be interesing to see what they focused on to make it so clear.

There are a few things. - They didn't make assumptions about what the person reading would already know. Everything simple was explained, and was there were link to prior docs where complicated concepts were needed (e.g end of day cash consolidation in a store, because Japanese stores worked differently to US and Europe.) That made it really easy to read any document in isolation. We had a really good wiki that cover…

This reminds me a lot of my recent trip to Japan. The country isn't such a delight to be in for anything special, it's just clear that _they put the effort in to doing the things most people know they should be doing_. It's this discipline?

Re: Working and Communicating with Japanese Engineers

#48

Post by Bridged7756 »

It is the expectation in my country to wait for your turn too, and seen as rude or a power display to speak over someone.

I also find that casual conversations are more turn based, and people are expected to continue a conversation by asking questions (of the other person). So this also means being mindful of how long you've spoken, and to ask a question about the other person instead, to not keep the other person just listening. The gauge is questions (or short responses), and the period is silence.

I find that questions pose less importance with US people, which might still use them, but not in the way we're used to. There i feel like the gauge is speaking (or short responses) and the period is silence.

Greetings like "how's it going" and "what's up" were confusing at first too, it took me a while to get when people were using them as greetings.

Re: Working and Communicating with Japanese Engineers

#49

Post by adrianN »

cedws wrote: post #43
bythreads wrote: post #15

Worked for years in japan, beg to disagree. Love japanese and japan but their work culture is horrific - Japanese are inefficient and the veneer of looking to work "hard" is more important than the hard work itself. People often stay until ridiculously late just to show they "put in the effort" which is more important than outcome. Then again that happens in many other countries as well ...

Yeah. I lived in Tokyo for 6 months as a digital nomad (so still working for an overseas employer.) As much as I love Japan, after hearing what the work culture is like I became pretty sure I didn't want to move there permanently. Not only is it an extremely unmeritocratic environment, the pay for software engs is rubbish. As a foreigner you'll more than likely be treated like dirt and passed up on for promotions. I…

I’ve heard people argue that Japan stays appealing because it is closed off and puts effort into maintaining their culture instead of modernizing into a generic western melting pot.

Re: Working and Communicating with Japanese Engineers

#50

Post by financltravsty »

throwaway173738 wrote: post #40
financltravsty wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This makes sense? User-facing touch points: everything a user can interact with Sign-up friction: self explanatory Stickiness: less bounce rate Lean: don't overload with touch points/bloat

You’re actually using jargon to explain jargon here. Try explaining all of this from the user’s perspective.

Which terms/explanations are confusing?
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