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Working and Communicating with Japanese Engineers

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Re: Working and Communicating with Japanese Engineers

#71

Post by financltravsty »

iso1631 wrote: post #56
financltravsty wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Which terms/explanations are confusing?

Sign-up friction, bounce rate, touch points, bloat

Sign-up friction: how much effort it takes to sign up; many times because it's hard to find the sign up page or the page itself has too many steps

Bounce rate: a bounce is someone visiting your site and not signing up. A bounce rate is the amount of people that do this compared to sign ups

Touchpoints: things a user interacts with, like a landing page, a nav bar with a sign up button, the sign up page itself, forms on that page, etc.

Bloat: too much "stuff" that is unnecessary towards some end goal like too much copywriting on the landing page, or too complex of a sign up flow, etc.

This isn't snark, but this is all industry standard terminology.

Re: Working and Communicating with Japanese Engineers

#72

Post by SpicyLemonZest »

mfuzzey wrote: post #19

"we really need to focus on user-facing touchpoints, because there’s too much sign-up friction. Like, we need to 10x the stickiness of the landing page but also keep it lean," Even as a native English speaker I find this type of language hard to understand, fluffy and ambiguous. We would all benefit from using plain language not just non native English speakers

None of the terms here are fluffy or ambiguous. They're about specific details or strategic categories that you (perhaps justifiably) don't find important. The original post's suggested rewording is reasonable, but it doesn't include all the information: the recipient won't know that the sender wants further improvement even though the latest build may be better than what's live, or that developers should avoid trading off scalability in the process.

Re: Working and Communicating with Japanese Engineers

#73

Post by zahlman »

> Make your English more understandable

This entire section is also good advice for working and communicating with English engineers. (Especially in a world where about 3/4 of English speakers don't have https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/English_language as their first language.)

> Create new meeting strategies

A lot of this is also relevant within English, honestly. (The phrase この認識で合っていますか is good to know and I definitely wouldn't have come up with it on my own.)

> If you notice that certain members are very quiet at a meeting, despite seeming like they have something to say, see if you can give them an opportunity. A simple “Does anyone else have thoughts on this?” can go a long way in making sure everyone feels heard.

This in particular also seems like something I've seen recommended in many other contexts.

> Lastly, be aware that some katakana words are commonly abbreviated differently in colloquial Japanese, often becoming unrecognizable to English speakers. Here are some examples: ... Topic/theme (of a meeting): テーマ (te-ma)

The others check out, but https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/%E3%83%86%E3%83%BC%E3%83%9E isn't an abbreviation. It's just.. a loanword that English speakers might well not recognize, because it comes from German Thema (in turn from Latin and Greek; so ultimately the same source as the English "theme", but by a separate path). Also because we don't often use the word "theme" this way, but yeah.

Re: Working and Communicating with Japanese Engineers

#74

Post by zahlman »

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 result is something like 90% of the coursework being in English, with random Tagalog words mixed in. The concept is called "Taglish" if I recall correctly.

Spoken Tagalog has always impressed me (though I can't really say I know any) for how freely English seems to be mixed in (and well pronounced, such that you notice the difference in phonology), in varying ratios. I'm quite sure there's a deliberate code-switching to it.

> people are deciding learning English isn't really necessary since AI translation has gotten "good enough" for most use cases.

It's honestly really impressive. Although I'm told it can occasionally glitch and treat the text as a prompt instead of just translating it.

Re: Working and Communicating with Japanese Engineers

#76

Post by lysace »

zahlman wrote: post #75
lysace wrote: post #7

Text is often a lot easier than speech.

I would say, text requires more effort (at a minimum, typing is slower than speaking); but it pushes you to do things that you should do in speech but rarely would do spontaneously.

It also allows the other person to take their time to understand and reply. They can use online translation tools etc.

(Edit: Now that I read this: I should try writing e.g. Chinese using these tools, next time, instead of defaulting to English. My mother language isn't English, but it's pretty close, comparatively speaking.)

A pattern I often end up with when there is a large language barrier: begin with long async messages that take a minute or two to write. End up with brief sync-ish messages as things get more detailed and we share more context.

Re: Working and Communicating with Japanese Engineers

#77

Post by zahlman »

lysace wrote: post #76
zahlman wrote: post #75

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I would say, text requires more effort (at a minimum, typing is slower than speaking); but it pushes you to do things that you should do in speech but rarely would do spontaneously.

It also allows the other person to take their time to understand and reply. They can use online translation tools etc. (Edit: Now that I read this: I should try writing e.g. Chinese using these tools, next time, instead of defaulting to English. My mother language isn't English, but it's pretty close, comparatively speaking.) A pattern I often end up with when there is a large language barrier: begin with long async…

Yes, that makes sense. One of the things that has made Discord, Slack etc. so important (and could have done the same for IRC if people weren't so intimidated by it) is that users feel free to switch between sync and async modes as appropriate.

Re: Working and Communicating with Japanese Engineers

#78

Post by orthoxerox »

avidiax wrote: post #5

I feel that everyone could learn and apply the idea of having clear, concise language without jargon. I've hear this notion called "international English". English spoken in a way that non-native speakers find relatively easy to understand and follow. The hard part of this is that non-native speakers will rarely ask for this. It's a gift that you have to give, and a gift you have to encourage others to give. And most…

It's always interesting to watch how a bunch of non-native speakers of English from different countries sitting in a room can talk to each easily, but when a Brit or an American joins, the conversation immediately collapses.

Re: Working and Communicating with Japanese Engineers

#79

Post by satvikpendem »

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…

It's worth living in Japan if you can control your work schedule, by working for a remote Western employer that may not know nor care that you're outside the West, or by having your own startup and product. Otherwise I'd agree.
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