Most advice about Japanese workplace culture is either mystical or outdated. Here is what our students actually report as surprising, and what matters practically.
The three that matter most
1. Report everything, early.
If something goes wrong - a machine stops, a delivery is short, you make a mistake - you tell someone immediately. Not after you have tried to fix it, and certainly not after your shift.
In many workplaces elsewhere, solving it quietly is initiative. In Japan it is a problem, because the person responsible could not act on information they did not have. A mistake reported at once is a small event. The same mistake discovered later is a serious one.
This is also the expected answer in interviews: interview questions.
2. Time is measured from before the start.
Arriving at the start time is late. Being changed, at your station and ready at the start time is on time - which usually means arriving ten to fifteen minutes early.
This applies to breaks and meetings equally, and it is the habit most often misread as a personal failing when it is simply an unstated rule.
3. Procedure over improvisation.
There is a correct order and a correct method, and following it matters even when your way is faster. Suggestions are welcome through the right channel, later. On the floor, follow the procedure.
The daily phrases that carry the social load
Japanese workplaces run on a small number of set expressions. Using them correctly signals that you understand the setting:
- おはようございます - used all day in some workplaces, not only in the morning
- おつかれさまです - the universal greeting between colleagues
- お先に失礼します - leaving before others, answered with おつかれさまでした
- すみません - apology, attention-getter, and thank-you, depending on context
- よろしくお願いします - untranslatable, and used constantly
Polite requests and keigo basics cover the register these sit in.
What is less true than you have heard
Endless overtime. Legally capped and increasingly enforced. Overtime exists and is paid; the stereotype of unlimited unpaid hours does not reflect most SSW workplaces. Check your contract: salary and deductions.
Compulsory drinking. Much reduced, and declining among younger colleagues. Refusing is normal.
Nobody speaks English. True in many workplaces, and irrelevant - you are there on a Japanese-language visa, and using Japanese from day one is what makes the first months work.
Hierarchy, practically
You will be given instructions by a direct supervisor, and questions go to that person rather than around them. Skipping a level to ask someone senior is read as strange rather than efficient.
Learn who your 先輩 are - the colleagues who joined before you - and ask them the small questions. That is what the relationship is for.
It gets easier quickly
Most of this becomes invisible within two months. What shortens the transition is Japanese: the more you understand of what is said around you, the faster the unwritten rules become visible.
Your first month of Japanese at work covers the language side, and if you have not yet measured where your Japanese stands, our free exam demo is a full JFT-Basic mock.