Shocked to see how co-workers are working!
Posted by: kirin on 
Dec 2nd, 2012 | 
Filed under: Daily Life, Something Weird...I’ve been working as a translator for a Japanese IT (information technology) company since June this year, even though I’m such a computer-illiterate person. lol Anyway, it just happened and my translation work doesn’t really require something technical so much, and even if it does, I can always ask around the engineers to get the exact image.
So my point here is that I’ve got a chance to see inside of a Japanese IT industry.
I’ve worked at a few Japanese companies so far, but I’ve never ever seen that employees are working day and night almost without sleeping!! In fact, what’s happening in the company I work for now is that delivery deadline is close and employees are staying up (over-time work) till midnight or even till 3 or 4am next morning and then start working from 9am again next day (already the same day!) .
Some male workers are working overnight for 2 days and 2 nights. I’m so shocked to know that. I couldn’t believe what I heard and what’s more, it was even shocking to me that those who are compelled to work like that say it’s how it is and they don’t feel anything about that! I wonder how could such working condition be taken as granted and approved!? (FYI, the company I work for now is a large corporation that every Japanese person from children to the elderly definitely knows its name.) I wouldn’t be able to accept that if I were the worker who had to work like that. I mean, if it’s my own business and my own project and I want to do it overnight with excitement, based on my own will, that would be possible but being kind of forced by a boss and doing this every now and then as a matter or course is just no way to me!! (T___T)
I told this story to some people including my husband and again I was shocked how most of them said that it’d be normal in Japan. I still feel shocked today.
BTW, I found this graph from Expedia Japan how difficult it is for the Japanese to take paid holidays. The graph shows in gray how many paid holidays were given yearly (in 2012) and how many of them were actually taken in red. I remember a German girl told me before that it was normal in Germany to have 30 paid holidays besides some sick leaves. In Japan, we have to use paid holidays for sick leaves. 
I don’t know if sick leaves are given aside from paid holidays in all of the other countries in this graph. If so, that should be also mentioned to illustrate how our working situation is outstandingly miserable!!
As you can imagine, this company is not doing something illegal. The workers working extra hours get paid extra. This is how the Japanese workers defend the deadline to the death. There’s imbalance of employment in our society that such workers are working like a horse while many people are jobless. Work sharing has never worked out in Japan.
I wonder…would it be normal in your country as well to do over-time work till 3 or 4am and start working for the next day from 9am again and do such from time to time when deadline is close? I can’t believe most of Japanese workers think it’s normal, but what do you think about that?
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December 2nd, 2012 at 2:14 pm
I live in Germany, and I think it depends on the branch you are working in. If you have something with many deadlines, I think you know before that you have to do sometimes overwork. But it is not normal and in German law, you also have to pay a higher salary for night work, and most companys also pay higher salary if you work more hours in a month as you are committed to in your working contract.
December 2nd, 2012 at 4:03 pm
In my first job, I was an IT consultant and went through exactly what your coworkers went through. I left New Zealand where people seldom work past six, and was soon routinely working from 8 until last train, and Saturdays and Sundays. On cut over, I once worked 70 hours straight. When I could finally get out to go to a hotel to rest for a few hours, I had heart palpitations that stopped me being able to sleep. All this when I was 24 and healthy! I can totally understand how Middle Ages guys in the same situation sometimes die at work.
Ironically, it is better now. Back around 2000, the status of IT consultants was still grey, in that my company treated us as exempt from overtime, and we were told not to record actual work hours. That has changed now. I got into a fight or two with my boss over being unable to work because of exhaustion. In the end of the day, you do it not because you are told, just because you just have to and everyone else is doing the same. And if you don't pull your weight, the social sanctions, and work oriented retaliation just makes the situation worse. IT is a crappy industry in Japan and this is why average employee turnover is around 3 years in a country where people still aspire to keep a job for life
December 2nd, 2012 at 4:06 pm
Hi Kirin!!! Nice to read your great posts, always interesting
That graph is really impressive and gives a lot of data.
What I conclude is that Spain has 30 days holiday like Brazil, Germany and so, but Japan has only 15??? Oh my got that's so little… And you only get paid 5 of those 15 days?
And Japan is the country with less paid holiday in the graph. That's somehow shocking.
No, it's not normal in Spain to work that much. In fact, it's the opposite way: once the "bell" sounds, everyone will try to get out from work even if there is work undone. Not everyone but a lot of people do that and don't ask them to work 30 more minutes.
Also, here there is a maximum amount of hours that a worker can work each week even counting extra hours so nobody can work until 4am and go sleep until 9am everyday because it would probably be much more than the legal maximum hours. And also a maximum amount of hours that someone can work EACH DAY. So for example, nobody can work on Mondays 24 hours and the other days 8 hours even when that doesn't reaches the maximum weekly hours.
Now I guess if in Japan there is an hours limit or you can work 24 hours all 7 days in a week.
I think the main difference is that Japanese people "work for their country" while Spanish and occidental people "work for own benefit". I read about that somewhere.
An interesting note, here in schools we start the course in September until December where we got 2 weeks Christmas holiday, then we end those holidays in 8 January, and the course continuas again until end of March, where we got "Semana Santa" (Saint Week), After that, the course continues until July where the schools close for Summer Holiday, all over July and August. So basically we take around 3 months vacation, more or less, 2 weeks in Christmas, one week in March and two months in July-August.
But in other jobs there are only 30 days holiday, plus specific and special days such as the day of the nation, the 25 december and so on.
Un saludo a todos. ¡¡Dile a tu marido que aprenda Inglés o Español!! Dile que si no lo hace ya no le preparas la comida
¿Qué tal está Pi-chan?
Yo para practicar Japonés veo películas en Japonés subtituladas, y así aprendo nuevas palabras y frases.
Ok, me voy a ver el fútbol que hoy juega my equipo favorito
Matane, adios, ciao, bye, auf wiedershen, adeus!!
December 2nd, 2012 at 4:35 pm
Hi Kirin,
I am a software engineer in San Francisco and we have a work process that is designed specifically to avoid this kind of abuse. We work from 9-6 and then GO HOME. There is no overtime and no weekend work; zero. The way it works is the business people choose their highest priority items and we tell them how much we can do with our time. If they want more, they have to wait.
Your company sounds like California back in 2000, in the dark ages…
December 2nd, 2012 at 6:24 pm
Wow! That is definitely NOT how things are here although there are surely plenty of people who are what we call "workaholics" and work night and day with barely a break. It's funny you wrote this – one of my stories, I may have sent you one- I set in Tokyo, the main character is a software engineer and the story opens with his boss calling him into the office and forcing him to take a week's vacation because he's working 80 hour weeks and is actually looking ill. Otherwise, the boss would have let him keep working that way! lol And he freaks out at first with anxiety attacks because he doesn't want to leave the office. I wrote this before I knew about the reality of what you're explaining here. I didn't know it was quite that extreme.
December 2nd, 2012 at 8:35 pm
I also work for an IT company (in California), and our engineers often work late hours on projects for customers. I don't necessarily think it's normal, but I guess sometimes it's necessary if they are on a tight deadline…? It would be nice if there was a way to make it so that they didn't have to work such hours, but maybe some of them who really enjoy the work don't mind. I think it would be interesting to talk to the engineers and find out.
Thank you for sharing~
December 2nd, 2012 at 10:20 pm
You are right. Worker also do have a life and family to take care. We are all normal human being.
December 3rd, 2012 at 5:03 am
I've heard of this a lot, mostly from articles and some josei manga.
i wonder,
does this mean the people staying later did not organize their time well?
did they decided to leave things to the last minute? is it something else?
most likely i would be shocked to hear if someone in US does that a lot and
think it's common. if there was such person I would tell them they need
to relax and not be so stressed. you know, find a balance between your
work and other life…..like sleeping and eating….
December 3rd, 2012 at 9:14 pm
Wow. I've never heard of people working until that late and getting up the same day!
I think in Denmark where I live, it really all depends on what kind of job you have. My mother works with children, and she sometimes has to work overtime but that's 'only' for about 2 hours at most. My father's job also requires extra work, but that's because of the economy where he works. They both low-paid jobs that doesn't require high educations, so there's not much to do with deadlines.
My friends parents are working at an office though – as leaders – and they work until about 10-11pm but I've never heard of them working until in the middle of the night. They have lots of meetings and paperwork, but they somehow manage to finish before that late. I don't think they would find it humane to even work so much, and that's how I think most people in my country thinks. The only kind of people that I know, who works until 2am-3am because of a deadline is students like myself..
But it sounds very extreme for someone to work for so long.. Don't they have a life beside working? I personally wouldn't be happy if I had to sit at an office and continue working, get minimal hours of sleep and then keep going at the same time as I met the other day.. I wonder if I'd ever be able to do such a thing..
I know my parents use some of their paid holiday to have sick-days though.
December 4th, 2012 at 12:07 pm
No, it's not normal. Not even here or at any other galaxy. And when people begin to think that it is… something is definitely off not only with the system but also with the inner environment of that human being. In my country we are having lots of economic problems but because of extreme corruption and lots are emigrating, so it's difficult to compare 'cause we have a lot of uncertainty here right now. But one thing is for sure, our life is so short to be slaves… and there's no reason for not working towards re-elaborating a better working system where everyone gets benefited by it.
This reminded me of a web page of a NGO there in Japan , I don't know if they're still activating but the purpose on it was related to the subject of your post. The Sloth Club http://www.sloth.gr.jp/E-index.htm
Here is an outside post from another site about the Slow Movement http://jorgandolif.com/discover/the-sloth-club-ja…
"Slow is Beautiful"
December 4th, 2012 at 11:00 pm
Thank you for your comment, Miuko.
It's the same over here that companies have to pay more for overtime. I think it's +25% more for overtime work before 10pm and +35% more for after 10pm. So those who worked like this will earn good amount of salary, in return.
December 4th, 2012 at 11:07 pm
Thank you Hiko, for sharing with us your experience. But I'm again shocked to hear what happened to you. I think the company I work for now allows their employees to record every single hour worked for overtime, and they get paid for the time they spent for work without fail…so that sounds like still better than your case…I'm so sorry to hear what happened to you. I hope your working conditions are much better than those days now.
December 5th, 2012 at 10:22 am
Hi Alberto,
Thank you for your comment.
I'm glad if TKE readers enjoy what I write about.
The graph says in average only 5 paid holidays are taken out of 13 days (this also includes sick leaves) , not even 15 days in Japan. Because of too much workload or our stupid culture that the boss is unhappy about his followers' taking paid holidays, many workers in Japan end up without taking days off that are even officially authorized.
I sometimes wonder what if I was born in Europe…:p
Gracias por tu mensaje.
Estamos muy bien. I like how you learn Japanese because that's exactly how I learn Spanish. ^ ^ Ganbatte!
December 5th, 2012 at 10:31 am
I wonder how the engineers can maintain dignity as a human being forced to work like that…
As for myself, I'm only a contracted worker who only takes care of translation and interpretation, so I didn't have to stay at the office so long hours. I'm not sure if this is really normal nowadays in Japan when our economy is in deflation. Our situation should be quite different from back in 2000, California, when you enjoyed dot com bubble economy.
December 5th, 2012 at 10:39 am
I'm not sure if I read that work of yours, but I'm also very much surprised to know it was quite that extreme! Those who worked like that nowadays take compensatory leaves because the project went through the hardest time successfully. That is a relief. But some people go to hospital because they are not feeling good. Oh I also hear that many workers in IT industry have mental illness. I'm sure such work style impacts them.
December 6th, 2012 at 10:47 pm
Oh I see, some of them may enjoy their work so they don't mind working like that…that's possible. Thank you for your point of view that I totally missed. ^ ^;;;
December 6th, 2012 at 10:49 pm
I think their families are so much concerned about this situation.
December 6th, 2012 at 10:58 pm
No, they are working hard all day and night long. It's not something like they leave things to the last minute. I think the number of engineers could be increased when it becomes too busy and work could be 8-hour shift or something and shared but most Japanese companies dislike work sharing because hiring 3 workers means to pay company benefit x 3 times instead of just x 1.
I think the one who worked the longest hour is a project manager, but for him I understand it'd be difficult to share it with 3 managers.
December 6th, 2012 at 11:14 pm
Thank you for your comment.
I hear Denmark is such a developed country especially in terms of social welfare and human right. I have a friend who is learning Danish (which is very very difficult for us Japanese to pronounce!) told me the other day how work is in Denmark. She told me that in Denmark, you can quit your job to go to school for free and then you can get support from your country. You can change jobs at any age in your life and people respect that.
In Japan, age is a big issue and changing jobs or careers is considered BAD and that's why most of Japanese people are too afraid to challenge something new. There's no support from our country when we go to school. Women are not equally working as men. Many occupations are for men only. Women who give birth to kids have hardest time to come back to work, and many end up with an easy part-time job such as a cashier even if they had professional skills and work experiences before they had kids.
That's one of the reasons why our country suffer from low birth rate. There is an idea that women who choose to have kids sometimes have to give up their career. Also, having kids costs too much money and with such small support from our country, some couples give up having kids because they want to avoid financial difficulties.
December 6th, 2012 at 11:16 pm
Thank you, Elle.
"Slow is Beautiful"
December 8th, 2012 at 4:16 pm
LoL
"I sometimes wonder what if I was born in Japan…" ^_^
Today I'm going to watch "Kuroneko", a Japanese terror movie, in Japanese and subtitles in German…
I love JP horror movies. Actually they are the only that can scare me and my gf doesn't want to see them because she says that after watching them we doesn't dares to go to bed!!!!
I love Ju-On and Dark Water (the JP version, not the USA version) Those are my both favorites terror movies.
And Onibaba is also great!!!! Although it didn't scared me too much, I love it.
Does Kuroneko means "Black cat"?
Because Neko = cat, and Kuro = black. Isn't it?
And if I say "Pi-cha inu desu ka", does that means "Is Pi-chan a dog?"
Matane!!!!
December 9th, 2012 at 7:16 am
Oh, horror movies are no way to me. >_< I've never seen any of them because I'm very much scared.
So you can ask me nothing about those JP movies. I don't even feel like seeing a DVD cover.
But you can ask me about Japanese language. ^ ^ You're right!
Kuroneko (黒猫) kuro (黒)=black, neko(猫)=cat
Pi-chan wa inu desu ka? (ぴーちゃんは犬ですか？) => You'll need particle (wa) when you mean subject.
Pi-chan is a subject in this sentence. (Yes, it means "Is Pi-chan a dog?")
Alberto wa supein jin desuka? (アルベルトはスペイン人ですか？)
(Is Alberto Spanish?)
Muy bien, estas aprendiendo japonés muy bien. (^_^)/~~~
January 29th, 2013 at 12:27 pm
Ah Kirin-san, NO ONE wants to work extra hours.
I think it is common in Asia that people work late. My mother used to work till 11pm sometimes and my brother and I don't get to see her. Sometimes my father stayed overnight at his own business. As children, we only saw our parents if they came back early at 8pm.
I hate this kind of thinking. People are like robots. I'm not saying my parents are robots, I think I blame more of the culture.
In the UK, people go home at 6pm, but sometimes you have to stay if there's work, or sometimes you can leave earlier too!
But staying till 4am is ridiculous. I never want to work like this, even if I get extra money for it.
It's bad for your personal self, we were not made to sit infront of the computers!!
January 30th, 2013 at 12:12 pm
Yeah I think this kind of culture is more common in Asia because it seems not only Japanese but also many Asian people don't mind working till late. It's difficult to live in a culture like this. I don't want to live like a robot, either.
But as for myself, I found a reduced work hour job (6 hours no overtime work) for less payment. I enjoy my life-work balance. I try to get extra income from investment or side job that is very different from my main work. Also, I wish to work from home so I can stay more time with Pi-chan and save commuting hours and fare for everyday.
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