I received an interesting question from a reader in Germany the other day, who is a software developer, and asked me whether he could get business from clients in Japan, but work remotely in Germany. This method of working is commonly called off-shoring in the software industry and as a...

A reader wrote in and asked about an article on overtime a while back, asking as an employer what the actual practical overtime rates actually are. This got me checking about the latest on the whole overtime issue, now that the economy is starting to move again, and what I found was interesting – it looks like the government is...

One marked difference about working for a foreign firm in Japan versus the home country is that most of the technology jobs are support and implementation roles than design and solutions oriented. This is because, simply, most foreign firms have their IT standards and requirements mandated by headquarters. Thus, the demand for engineers and PC/networking experience...

If you're a gadget freak, another really excellent tool for learning how to read Kanji is an electronic dictionary. While there are a number of these on sale at any Denkiya-san, the problem is that most of them are made for Japanese users trying to learn English, not the other way around. There is one that stands out, however, and has been long regarded as...

"Today please permits abrupt impoliteness. The true characteristic package stalk there is no other choice but to operate, reached the point where you can reform by your. The turtle head exposes completely in approximately 2 weeks. We complete also the repayment system when there was no effect. True characteristic package stalk special sight 'crane maquis'..." You must be thinking "oh dear - Lloyd has flipped". Nope, the Mr. Turtle Head passage from above is...

Recently the Nikkei newspaper announced its annual compensation details for directors of 100 Japanese public companies. The amount being paid, mainly to executive (employed at the company) directors was JPY32 million (US$290,000) per year, not an insignificant amount but certainly lower than many other countries for similarly sized listed firms. According to the Nikkei, the highest director payouts were at...

If you're new to Japan and have been tasked with setting up a company here, one of the biggest challenges is hiring and retaining new staff. Core to incentivizing a Japanese employee to enter and remain at a relatively small and probably unknown company is to get the...

The ideal size for a software sales and support outpost in Japan is about 10 to 20 people. Broken down, the numbers are typically: CEO, PA/office manager, sales manager and 2-3 sales people, engineering manager and 2-3 engineers, marketing manager, and then possibly assistants for all of the above managers. Note that I haven't included an accounting or HR manager. For the first...

The next series of articles targets overseas managers tasked with setting up an office in Japan (Tokyo) and who may be wondering what a typical hiring model looks like – or entrepreneurs fighting for access to the same bilingual personnel as the big boys. First, let’s look at the importance of the CEO and your general strategy for making initial hires...

A reader wrote to me asking about a friend who has a PhD in Computer Science and who is working as a professor at a prestigious US university. His wife is Japanese and they are thinking about returning to Japan for a while. The friend wants to get an academic job here in Japan and wants to know how to go about it. This is not the first time I've been asked this question, but information about the subject is extremely limited. Indeed, I don't think I've ever seen a traditional academic (university) job in Japan advertised...