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Relying on Recruiters to Find a Job in Japan or Overseas

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Summary

(Just personal opinions below, for thought and discussion)

We talked about:

My background and attendee’s background - In this case, it was IT

  • What is your background and what kind of job do you want to do?

      1. Thinking about roles like Product Manager in IT, or experience with specific platforms. Example is opentext https://www.opentext.com/what-we-do/products/enterprise-content-management/content-management/opentext-content-suite-platform
      2. Think about common points with your future job
      3. Same industry as you worked in? You understand the business background.
      4. Same role or working with the same stakeholders? (marketing, etc)
      5. Understanding of connection between IT and the business goals and being able to explain it in interviews, and the results that it contributes to. This can be applied to the next job, whatever the underlying platform or technology is.

  • What have you done so far to apply for a job

      1. Applying to recruiters
      2. Joining job portals, uploading resumes
      3. Personal networking, asking for introductions from friends and acquaintances
      4. Introductions from networks, (alumni, business associations, meetups)

  • Relying on recruiters and trying other ways of finding a job

      1. Internet Job Boards (Daijob, Careercross, Gaijinpot, Indeed, etc.)
      2. The SCCJ  (Swiss Chamber of Commerce) http://www.sccij.jp/news/overview/detail/article/2016/09/23/sccij-sponsors-renowned-scholarship-fund-for-interns/
        1. The Swiss Chamber and Startups http://www.sccij.jp/news/overview/detail/article/2017/12/18/connecting-swiss-startups-with-japan/
      3. Other Chambers of Commerce (look at members and Jobs)
      4. Event Calendar SCCIJ  http://www.sccij.jp/events/event-calendar/

  • Having a linkedin profile and applying directly to companies

    1. Looking for startups

      1. via Meetups, Justa.io and Angelist or The Bridge http://thebridge.jp/en/

    2. The lead time for a job

      1. can be up to 3 months from resume submission to offer, with 4 or more interviews in office or via phone/video. Can be shorter for internships with a view to being permanent.

    3. Interviews

      • Simple greeting to the interviewer, shows knowledge of the culture and willingness to learn and use Japanese
      • It gets better with practice and can be a good summary of who you are. Simple and short is fine.
      • Concluding the Japanese part of the interview or leaving the interview, it is always good to say thanks.
      • If you know keigo great, but not necessary to worry about it during the interview. Japanese level is evaluated but even if you don’t know keigo, if you have a good command of business Japanese, or just are able to express yourself in standard Japanese, that is fine. Language ability is a threshold but keigo is very rarely the determining factor for a foreign hire.

    4. Using your Japanese

      1. I believe it is good to include Japanese in the interview, even if you are N3 or N4 (JLPT levels).
      2. Go Aisatsu
      3. Jiko Shokai
      4. Thank you
      5. Keigo

  • Other languages 

    If you know other languages it is a plus if they have a use within the hiring company
        1. Language of the home country - English, a European or Asian language, and/or any language in which the company conducts business in its home area.
        2. Asian language - If the Asia headquarters is outside of Japan, it can be useful or beneficial to have command of Chinese (Mandarin or Cantonese). Just a nice to have element on the resume unless you are specifically involved in supporting Chinese customers.
        3. On the other hand, if it isn’t related to the company’s business, there is no need to include a language unless there is fluency unless it’s an ongoing hobby or interest you want to mention in the interview.

  • Determining Salary 

    Recruiters can be a big help in determining salaries, range for the position and whether your desired salary is reachable. Job portals and online websites also have good benchmarks.
        1. Check out Daijob’s salary database of candidates https://www.daijob.com/en/ecompany/index.html Can be a good view of the competition out there on the market
        2. Look at the type of jobs available by salary level  https://www.daijob.com/en/jobs/?pg=0
        3. Careercross has a good salary guide  https://www.careercross.com/en/salary-survey
        4. Robert Walters Japan salary guide  https://www.robertwalters.co.jp/content/dam/robert-walters/country/japan/files/salary-survey/E-Book2017.pdf
        5. Hays Salary check  https://www.hays.co.jp/en/salary-check/index.htm

  • Resume/CV Style

    1. Check your resume or ask someone you trust to review it. It should be in active voice, tying your actions to the results of your employer to show your value to the company.
    2. Japanese and English versions of a resume are good to submit, hiring managers might prefer to use the Japanese version during the interview. It can be in the same format as your English resume, unless specifically requested to submit in “rirekisho” format.
    3. Look at different formats  http://www.americasjobexchange.com/career-advice/types-of-resume-formats
    4. Further explanation of formats  https://www.thebalancecareers.com/resume-formats-with-examples-and-formatting-tips-2063591
    5. Visual representation  https://www.cpresumes.com/resume-samples/

  • Self-education, Training resources

    1. I use Youtube quite a lot, to view topics related to work that I am interested in. So for me, IT and Operations topics have a lot of resources on Youtube that give good overviews or summaries of topics. Topics I enjoy are Kanban and Devops.
    2. I have also used Linkedin’s Lynda platform https://www.lynda.com/   for online courses. Since I am interested in coding for the web, I have used coursera https://www.coursera.org/ and codeacademy https://www.codecademy.com/

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