This week marks my first week of working in Japan!
Working in a startup scene, my job isn’t a traditional Japanese company but the company was established in Japan, for Japanese consumers and many Japanese clock in and out every day (although 22 different nationalities work together). Also, my New Zealander husband works for a super traditional Japanese company where around 99% of workforce is Japanese (!).
Some Japanese work culture, like the business card swapping, and the overtime may be quite familiar. However, combining my 4 days of work experience and my husband’s 5 years work experience at a Japanese company (over 5 months in Japan), here are some of the differences of working in Japan compared to working in Australia:
Tax, insurance, tax, insurance
I appreciate that my rubbish gets collected, the clean road I walk on and efficient public transport that I catch are only some of the many benefits that are funded by the tax that every hard working citizen pays. Perhaps, Japan clarifies how everything’s getting paid but there are a lot of mandatory payment to the government. Income tax, residence tax as well as governmental social insurance programs: health, pension and labor insurance. All are compulsory.
Residence tax is paid towards the city that you live in and I believe the more country side it is, the cheaper it is. The insurance are paid by the collective workforce for the collective workforce so I am not building up my own pension every month through my salary but it is for the millions of retired folks receiving it this month.
Labor insurance is apparently the fund that government provides for workers compensation or when you’re in between jobs.
Tax is dependent on your marital status, number of dependents, employment status and other factors.
Interestingly, the residence tax are calculated by the previous year’s salary, so as I don’t have a previous salary, I don’t pay any until June next year. I can either pay all at once (around 6-10% of your salary), pay it in 3 installments or request for the employer to deduct it from the monthly salary. Sounds complicated but an average taxpayer who works for one company doesn’t have to file a tax return so that’s simple.
I look forward to receiving my first paycheck in yen but unsure how much will actually hit my piggy bank!
Dress for success
Men generally wear white shirt, black suits and clean black hair with no bear or facial hair. After Golden Week, a system called “Cool Biz” takes place where men aren’t required to wear suit jacket but can wear short sleeved shirt to survive the intense Japanese summer.
For women, it’s the women’s “manner” to wear make up (but not too much), sheer pantyhose no matter the weather when wearing a skirt, 5-7 cm heels no matter how uncomfortable and neatly tied up hair. Some corporation doesn’t like women wearing pants, just because. Catching the wave of the #MeToo movement, 21,000 Japanese women have had enough of blistered feet while dashing to buy a replacement pantyhose at convenience store and have signed a petition to cease the requirement for women to wear high heels. Sadly, the #KuToo (in Japan, kutsu means shoes and kutsuu means pain) moment hasn’t moved the Japanese health minister but the news has moved across the Pacific Ocean to Sydney Morning Herald.
Luckily for me, I can wear casual clothes to work and my husband adores his extensive suit collection.
Lunch time is team time
In Australia, lunch time was my personal time. I went to the gym, grab lunch outside, bring lunch from home and eat it at work while I read, book an appointment or go shopping. Many of my workplaces were flexible so I may take 30 minutes one day, one hour the next and none the next day but no one asked, as it was “my time”.
It is either because there are so many amazing eateries offering lunch deals and/or because it is sadly quite common for Japanese who ‘can’t cook’, many eat out every lunch break!
The lunch spots are generally a few minute walk from our office and they have 10 or so 定食 (Teishoku or set menu) that make the decision making easy. The price is generally 1000 yen or AUD$12 and are generally a balanced meal where you’ll get a bowl of rice, miso soup, pickled vegetable, salad and the main dish (cooked chicken, vegetable and meat stir fry etc) and tea if you go to a traditional Japanese restaurant.
I do enjoy eating out and chatting with my new team mates but I am worried about:
- Cost – 1000yen per lunch means 5000yen a week and roughly 20,000yen a month (AUD$230). Considering the point 1 of tax and insurances I’m paying, this is a load of expense especially for someone who nearly always brought a packed lunch and spent roughly AUD$20/month for lunch.
- Health – I usually packed some salad, boiled egg and a can of tuna or leftovers from the night before. Although these set menus are fresh and delicious, they are a full meal! It’s hard to focus after meal when my stomach is absolutely full.
- Speed – I’m a slow eater but I try to eat quicker as I’m conscious that people want to get back to work and their plates are empty. Yet, keeping in mind the first point of cost, I don’t want to leave much on my plate just because others have scoffed their meal. Such a dilemma.
- Social overload – people from another team sometime join my team’s lunch and it’s interesting to talk to different people but as an introvert, I need some time on my own to recharge.
Note: I do notice that people from other team bring their lunch or some goes to the gym downstairs.
At my husband’s work, a bell rings at 11:30am every week day (or 12:00pm during summer) and the building light is turned off to signal lunch time. Generally, the team marches down to the cafeteria and wolves down a meal collectively as a team and leaves as a team. That said, my husband often eats out with a colleague or two as he gets sick of the same meal at the cafeteria. My friend who worked in a male dominated team was overwhelmed trying to keep up with her male colleague’s gusto in inhaling their food until she gave up and decided to not join them as she was a contractor.
The first week is a treat and for the first time in my 9 year career, I will eat out every lunch for a week. However, I definitely cannot continue this so I have to learn to say no (even though it’s a very un-Japanese thing to do) as I wish to savor my lunch in solitude, ideally with a sketchbook or a book in my hand.
Leave is leave
In Australia, a full time employee generally is allowed 20 days of annual leave and 10 days sick leave.
In Japan, you have to earn to take some time off. First year at a company is generally 5 or 10 days leave and you build it up from there but these days of leave includes every leave you need; if you want a holiday, when you’re sick or when you’re kid’s sick. Rather than booking 10 day holiday, people generally book a shorter holiday in case they get sick later in the year.
At least there are many public holidays in Japan but I feel that I can only truly recharge when I a take a good 1-2 weeks off. Understanding the leave situation, I now see why Japanese tourists travel far for such a short period of time and pack as much as possible every day because every minute counts on their holiday.
Stay…I say stay!
I’m not sure what the reasoning behind it is, but juniors in traditional Japanese companies won’t leave until their boss leaves the office. It may be because they need to stay just in case they can assist their boss at any moment. However, as you may expect, a manager has much more responsibility than a junior and many of the manager’s role cannot be delegated to a junior.
Sadly, junior wastes their nights sitting in front of their desk waiting for their boss to leave. I have heard that some boss “go home” but heads out to dinner to let their subordinates leave and heads back to the office to finish their job for the day. I’m not sure who these charades are for but it doesn’t seem to help anyone but I may be too lucky to avoid such rituals.
Nominucation
The work doesn’t end when you clock off at the office.
The above point may indicate that Japanese have a very distinct outside facing exterior and the actual truth (in Japan, we call this 本音と建前, honne and tatemae or the true voice and the outward facing facade). The culture doesn’t allow an honest, sometimes brutal truth to be voiced especially in public. Hence like a bunch of awkward teenagers, many Japanese workforce lean on alcohol as the truth potion. It is very common to go for a drink after work to build rapport. Many people, even when they’re not a strong drinker will feel the necessity to join these drinking session as this relationship building leads to job promotion.
PS: 飲む (Nomu) in Japanese means to drink and a drinking session is called 飲み会 (nomikai) hence combining Communication and nomi became “Nominucation”.
Did any of the points surprised you or have you worked in Japan? I would love to hear your thoughts (and if you have any tips in surviving work at a new country!).
Native Expat 
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