海归在日本不受欢迎

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TOKYO — Ronan Sato, a graduate student in applied statistics at Oxford, has always been keen to work in his native Japan. But at a careers fair for overseas Japanese students, he found that corporate Japan did not return his enthusiasm.

In meetings with a handful of Japanese financial trading firms at the forum in Boston last November, none would offer him a job without further interviews in Tokyo.

So Mr. Sato, who received three offers on the spot from non-Japanese corporations, accepted a position in Tokyo with a big British bank.

“I really wanted to gain experience at a Japanese company, but they seemed cautious,” he said. “Do Japanese companies really want global talent? It seemed to me like they’re not really serious.”

Notoriously insular, corporate Japan has long been wary of embracing Western-educated compatriots who return home. But critics say the reluctance to tap the international experience of these young people is a growing problem for Japan as some of its major industries — like banking, consumer electronics and automobiles — lose ground in an increasingly global economy.

Discouraged by their career prospects if they study abroad, even at elite universities, a shrinking portion of Japanese college students is seeking higher education in the West. At the same time, Japan’s regional rivals, including China, South Korea and India, are sending increasing numbers of students overseas — many of whom, upon graduation, are snapped up by companies back home for their skills, contacts and global outlooks.

“Japanese companies here are missing out on the best foreign talent, and it’s all their fault,” said Toshihiko Irisumi, a graduate of the University of Chicago Booth School of Business and former Goldman Sachs banker. He runs Alpha Leaders, a Tokyo-based consulting firm that helps match young talent with employers based in Japan. “They really need to change their mind-set.”

A United States-born graduate of Brown University who has a dual citizenship in Japan, one of about 12 foreign-educated Japanese nationals interviewed for this article, said she was told she “laughed too much” in interviews for a technology job in Tokyo.

Others with Western educations recall being treated with suspicion by Japanese recruiters, who referred to them openly as “over spec” — too elite to fit in, too eager to get ahead and too likely to be poached or to switch employers before long.

What is more, Japanese students who study overseas often find that by the time they enter the job hunt back home, they are far behind compatriots who have already contacted as many as 100 companies and received help from extensive alumni networks. And those who spend too long overseas find they are shut out by rigid age preferences for graduates no older than their mid-20s.

In a survey of 1,000 Japanese companies taken last June on their recruitment plans for the March 2012 fiscal year by the Tokyo-based recruitment company Disco, fewer than a quarter said they planned to hire Japanese applicants who had studied abroad. Even among top companies with more than a thousand employees, less than 40 percent said they wanted to hire Japanese with overseas education.

That attitude might help explain why, even as the number of Japanese enrolled in college has held steady at around three million in recent years, the number studying abroad has declined from a peak of nearly 83,000 in 2004 to fewer than 60,000 in 2009 — the most recent year for which the figures are available from the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development.

In some ways, the Japanese snubbing of Western graduates is a testament to the perceived strength of their own universities, seen by many here as more prestigious than even the best American and European schools — despite mediocre showings in various global college rankings.

At American universities, 21,290 Japanese students were registered last year, fewer than half the number a decade ago — even though the overall number of Japanese enrolled in college has been constant, at around 3 million. American universities last year had 73,350 students from South Korea, which has less than half of Japan’s population,

“There is an awareness that Japan’s competitiveness is falling, and we need a more global work force,” said Kazunori Masugo, head of the Senri International School in western Japan and a member of a central government committee on education and training. Lessons at Senri are taught mostly in English and the school sends a handful of students to colleges in the United States and Europe each year.

“But the environment in Japan is such that if you go overseas to study, you have to be prepared to go your own route, find your own way,” he said.

Ryutaro Sakamoto, who paid his way through the University of Toronto and returned to Japan at age 30 with a business degree, found he was too old to apply through standard recruitment programs. He sent résumés to the likes of Panasonic and Sony, anyway, but never heard back. Eventually, the Japanese unit of the American insurance company Prudential was happy to put his bilingual skills to use.

“In Japan, taking the time to study overseas sets you back in the shukatsu race,” he said.

“Shukatsu” refers to the system in which Japanese companies typically hire the bulk of their workers straight from college and expect them to stay until retirement. Not getting a job upon graduation is seen as a potential career killer.

So competition is fierce. In the last three years, the percentage of new graduates in Japan who found work was the lowest since the government started collecting comparable data in 1996. As of Feb. 1, with two months left in the recruiting season, a fifth of students in their final year at college had yet to find jobs.

“Shukatsu is like Kabuki theater,” said Takayuki Matsumoto, an Osaka-based career consultant. “It’s difficult when you don’t fit the template.”

His advice to returnees: don’t be too assertive or ask too many questions.

Kenta Koga, one of only a handful of Japanese undergraduates to enter Yale in 2010, violated many unwritten rules last summer as an intern at a big Japanese advertising agency in Tokyo. On client rounds with his boss, who was advising on trends in technology or social media, Mr. Koga, a computer science major, felt the urge to speak up.

“Some of what they were discussing was old or plain wrong,” he said. But he was careful to steep his language in the appropriate honorifics reserved for elders. “I’m terribly sorry to interrupt,” he said he would murmur. “My deepest apologies if you already knew this.”

Still, his supervisors were annoyed. “You are being too scary and preventing other people from speaking,” one boss said, according to Mr. Koga. On another occasion, he said, he was censured for crossing his arms in front of senior colleagues. He was eventually excluded from meetings and assigned seemingly dead-end tasks. He now says he would never work for a Japanese company.

Some Japanese companies have made a point of reaching out to returnees. U-Shin, an auto parts maker, attracted attention in February when it placed a prominent ad in Japan’s largest business daily offering twice the normal starting pay to candidates with overseas degrees.

“We plan to expand aggressively overseas, so we need recruits who were themselves bold enough to go overseas,” said Koji Tanabe, U-Shin’s chief executive.

But U-Shin seems the rare exception. The Japanese financial giant Bank of Tokyo-Mitsubishi more closely fits the norm. Each year, it hires about 1,200 fresh graduates. Usually, fewer than 20 have studied overseas or are non-Japanese, said Keiichi Hotta, a recruiter for the bank.

“We’re cautious because we emphasize continuity and long-term commitment to the company,” he said. “Especially in finance, we don’t want people who are focused on short-term gains.”

No wonder some returnees play down their exposure to Western ways. Norihiro Yonezawa, who studied for a year at the University of Maryland, said he did not emphasize overseas experience or English skills when he interviewed — successfully — for a coveted job at Panasonic.

“I didn’t want to come across as a show-off. So I stressed how I worked hard and overcame that,” he said. “And I made sure to emphasize that I would still fit in.”



东京——Ronan Sato是美国牛津大学应用统计学院的研究生。他一直想要学成回国，报效祖国；但日本的公司却没有录用他。最后，他只能到东京的一家英国银行上班。他感叹道：“我真的很想到日本公司汲取经验，但他们似乎很谨慎。日本公司真的想要全球化的才能吗？我觉得他们对此并不重视。”

众所周知，一直以来日本对海归的态度就很谨慎。一些评论家指出日本的这种态度将会和它的一些重点工业问题一样日益严重，导致其在经济全球化中处于不利地位。受此影响，越来越少日本学生愿意去国外学习。相反，中国、韩国、印度则送越来越多的学生到国外学习，这些留学生一毕业就被国内的大公司争相聘请。

日本人真的需要转换他们的思维方式。

本文采访了大约12名海归学生，其中有一名学生因在面试过程中“笑得太多”而遭到拒绝。其他海归学子回忆，他们经常被面试官用怀疑的眼光看待，或直接对他们说他们“超过规格了”——这样的精英不适合这工作，太急着升职，很容易被挖脚或很快就会离职，自己当老板。另外，海归学子人际关系有限，得到的帮助也很有限。而且常在年龄问题上遭到拒绝。

去年六月就公司的招聘计划采访了1000家日本企业，其中只有不到四分之一的公司愿意雇佣海归学子。就算是员工超过一千人大公司，也只有不到40%想要聘用海外留学生。因此，近年来在海外学习的日本学生人数剧减，从2004年的83,000 到2009年的60,000.从一定程度上说来，日本人冷落海外学子是因为他们本土的大学有所发展，甚至比美国或欧洲最好的大学还要有名望。

Kazunori Masugo， 日本一家西方国际学校校长，同时作为一名公务员，说道：“值得注意的是，日本的竞争力正日益下降，所以，我们需要一支更加全球化的劳动力。”“但从目前日本的就业形势来看，你如果去海外学习，那么你可能要准备好走自己的路，找到你自己的方向。”

在日本，人们认为在外国学习最终会让你在shukatsu竞赛中失利。Shukatsu指的是日本企业的招聘模式——直接从大学招聘，然后希望员工一直工作到退休。如果，在毕业前还没找到工作，你的职业生涯很可能还没开始就结束了。所以，就业竞争非常激烈。

“Shukatsu就像是找歌舞伎，一旦你不符合要求，那么进入这行就会很困难，”大阪的一位职业生涯咨询师说，所以，他对海归提出以下建议：不要过分自信，也不要问太多问题。

Kenta Koga 是耶鲁大学的本科生，当他在东京一家广告公司实习时因违反了一些不成文的规定，而受到不公正待遇——不让他参加会议，尽把一些棘手的任务交给他。现在，他决定再也不要到日本企业工作了。

但也有一些企业也非常重视聘用海归，U-Shin 汽车零件制造商二月登出的招聘广告提出：将用两倍薪金聘请海归学子。但像U-Shin这样的公司还是比较少的。就连日本金融巨无霸东京银行也坚持标准，它每年招1200名应届毕业生，通常情况下，只有不到20个人是海归或外国人。它的一位招聘人员说：“我们如此谨慎是出于对公司利益的考量，我们不需要那些只关注短期利益的人。”

因此，一些海归在应聘时并不会说自己的留学经历。




评论翻译

Jerry

So how attractive would an American graduate of the University of Tokyo be to an American firm if the graduate wanted to return to the United States?

那么，如果一名在东京大学毕业的美国学生想要回到美国工作，他的文凭对于美国的公司有多大的吸引力呢？



kunosoura

Jerry, in recent years Univ Tokyo was one of the best engineering schools. Only top students need apply. Tuition was free. Competition was fierce. They were considered a national key resource. I don*t kno wif still true, but best schools are now in China and India. I assume Rensselaer Polytech is still a good school, if you have the money.

Jerry，近几年来，东京大学是最好的工科院校之一。只有最优秀的学生需要申请，而后免费就读。竞争非常激烈。他们被当做国家最主要的人才资源。我不知道这还是不是真的，但现在最好的学校都在中国和印度。我认为伦斯勒理工学院仍然是一所好的学校，只要你有钱去就读。



Ron Bannon

Japan's unwillingness to accept Western train bankers may be the only thing that will save them. What a disaster these dopes have proved.

日本不愿接受西方模式训练出来的银行家，也许这是可以拯救他们的唯一途径。这些笨蛋真是表现得一塌糊涂。



Sam

I agree. I was particularly struck by what Mr. Hotta said, that “Especially in finance, we don’t want people who are focused on short-term gains.”

我同意，Hotta先生说的话令我深受打击，“尤其在金融业，我们不需要那些只关注短期利益的人们。”



Shivaji Banerjee

It is not right or wrong, but people from Japan seem to be very inert (noble?). I have the fortune to interact with people from almost every culture and never found a close comparison. But to be on this topic, when Sony and Panasonic were ruling the world, were they more open to Western Grads? Maybe now they should seek admission in BRIC countries since that is The Next Market!

这不是对或错的问题，但是日本人似乎非常懒惰。我很幸运，有机会与来自不同文化领域的人进行交流，但从未能好好比较他们的差异。但在这个话题上，当索尼和松下统治全世界时，他们不是反而对西方毕业生更加开放吗？也许，他们现在应该寻求机会进入“金砖四国”，毕竟他们是下一个“世界市场”。



Greenpa

It is hardly a new problem. Gosh- an old established organization is resistant to change from outside? Whodathunk?!
Sounds like a terrific business opportunity for me. A couple of returning whiz kids should open a business in Japan - offering rehabilitation training for returning whiz kids: "How To Be Japanese Again". Couldn't fail!

这已经不是一个新问题了。Gosh 是以前成立的一个组织，极力反对从外部开始改变、

对我来说似乎是一个极好的商业机会。几个从海外学成归来的优等生可以在日本开一间事务所——为海归学子提供回复训练，让他们学会“如何再次成为日本人”。绝不会失败！



Markham Kirsten,MD

The strenght in the United States intellectual life is our ability to assimilate into our melting pot the intelligencia of the world. Seen as a weakness at times, that we do not have enough room in our own universities, we welcome with open arms those with a university degree. The insular countries like Japan, and the Moslem world who protect their own entrenched elites, fail to import the talents of others and deprive themselves of this resource.

在美国与一批知识分子共同生活的经历，成为让我们融入世界熔炉的优势。有时，我们的公司没有足够的空间去容纳每个学生，这是我们的劣势所在。但我们还是会竭诚欢迎那些大学毕业生。像日本这样的岛国以及MSL世界，只会保护地位牢固的精英阶层，不能引进其他人才，使他们自己丧失了大量的人力资源。



Richard

While this may be true for entry level positions in Japan, it is definitely not the case for experienced employees in certain businesses and professions. In law, the area I am familiar with, Japanese law firms, companies and government agencies strongly encourage their employees to come to the United States for graduate programs. In fact, in many cases they finance the student's educational expenses here and support temporary family relocation.

在日本的入门级职业来看，这可能是真的，但对于那些在特定商务或行业经验丰富的人员来说，绝不是那么回事！在我所熟知的法律领域，在日本律师事务所，企业和政府机构极力鼓励他们的员工到美国上研究生课程。事实上，在许多情况下，他们会为这些学生担负学习经费，并且短期内会为他们安置家庭。



Don Seekins

Note that most of the Japanese who study at places like Oxford or Yale are probably pretty well-off, and that the "system" in Japan is in the end discriminating against a rather small number of high-flyers, while the people who stay home - the vast majority - are benefiting from an admittedly imperfect situation. Japanese culture emphasizes loyalty and modesty. After reading an article today on Donald Trump, I wonder if we couldn't learn a little from them?

既然大多数在牛津或耶鲁学习过的日本人都可能变得相当富裕，而且日本的那套“体制”最后还会排斥那些抱负极高的人；另外，那些留在国内的大多数人还能从公认不完善的体系中受益。日本文化强调忠诚以及谦逊。今天，读了一篇关于唐纳德·特朗普的文章，我就想难道我们还不能从他们身上获取教训吗？



SD

"Especially in finance, we don’t want people who are focused on short-term gains.”
I take the article's point, but that part sounds exceptionally reasonable...

“尤其是在金融业上，我们不需要那些只关注短期利益的人。”

我抓到了这篇文章的重点所在，但那部分听起来还是非常合理的。。。。



Ricky Barnacle

Any proof at all of a correlation between an "international" education and competitiveness?
And if this type of education means bringing Wall St. and/or Madison Ave. strategies to Japan, no wonder they're saying "No thanks", based on the current condition of the world economy given to us by these MBA know-nothings.

根本没有相关证据能够证明“国际性”教育与竞争力之间的关系。

而且，如果这种教育类型能够为日本带来华尔街或麦迪逊大道的战略模式，根据这些无知的工商管理学硕士给我们的当前的世界经济情况，也难怪他们会说“别见外”了。



Daniel

Taking a good look at the current state of the US and European economies, why exactly would they want Western-trained graduates? Maybe they ought to take a lesson from the US Congress on "how to get things done" too, eh?

好好看看美国及欧洲的当前经济情况，为什么他们只招到在西方学习过的毕业生呢？也许他们也需要向美国国会学习一下“如何做好事情”，对吧？



Kei-bon

The article cites the drop in the number of Japanese studying at US universities as evidence of chauvinism, but surely Japan's extended recession is largely to blame. And don't the higher numbers in the past suggest that experience studying abroad has been perceived as an advantage in the job market?

这篇文章引用在美国大学学习的日本学生人数的减少作为沙文主义的证据，毫无疑问，这都要归咎于日本不断扩大的经济衰退形势。另外，过去有比较多的学生在美国就学并不是暗示说海外留学经历能够让你在人才市场上取得优势。



Chi

I am not sure America or Europe are in any position to be lecturing anyone on the 'state of their economy'. It really is the height of arrogance to suggest there is something wrong with the Japanese system for preferring local graduates. I should note most Americans do not venture out for degrees and many American companies essentially discriminate against those with foreign degrees.

我并不确定美国或欧洲有立场就“他们的经济情势”对任何人讲道。提出日本偏爱本土毕业生的体制存在问题，这本身就是一件非常骄傲自大的行为。我注意到大多数美国人都不会出国求学，而且很多美国企业基本上都排斥那些拿着外国学位的人。



Siobhan

You raise some very good points. There are American companies that will only look at US graduates of certain universities, and circular file the others.

你提到了一些很好的点。有一些美国企业只聘用某些大学的毕业生，而不看其他学校毕业生的情况。



Nyongesa

Japan has been in a two decades long economic funk, known as the lost decade, for which there seems no end. If you were to read the Japanese press you would see it is an major obsession of there's to discuss. It has nothing to do with arrogance.
On your second point, there's not a country in the world with as many foreign born nationals at top managerial positions, than in U.S. firms. There is a massive influx of international students into U.S. universities, who are then hired into U.S. firms at unprecedented levels. I know many dozens of Africans with senior responsibilities in U.S. firms, who's equivalent classmates in Europe have reached nowhere as substantial.

日本已经经历了二十年的经济恐慌，在迷失的十年间，恐慌似乎永无休止。如果你看过日本新闻界出版的读物，你就会看到主要讨论的还是沉迷问题，与骄傲自大毫无关系。

另外，世界上再没有哪个国家的公司高层管理人中外国出生的侨民数会比美国公司的还多。有大量的留学生进入美国大学，然后这些学生就会以前所未有的水平被美国公司雇用。我知道许多非洲人在美国公司中担任要职，他们的同窗在欧洲也取得了实质性的成就。



JimBob

To oversimplify a bit: Japanese companies want their employees to be slave/robots. The influence of the West with all its notions of individuality and personal freedom is antithetical to this relationship. A tainted employee might start giving others ideas about passive deference to superiors and acceptance of rote work assignments.

简单来说：日本企业希望他们的员工作为奴隶或机器人。西方世界个人观念及人身自由理念的影响与日本企业的理念是相对立的。一个人一旦被同化，就会开始建议其他人被动服从高层人员，接受一成不变的工作安排。



Kyzl Orda

We have something similar here -- there is reluctance to hire Americans who obtained Middle Eastern Studies degrees for government jobs. The idea being they may be too sympathetic to arab regimes. This was common during the Bush era and those hiring officials are still pocketed in the government. Nevermind that this is malarkey. The government has overlooked experience and knowledge in favour of lack of knowledge of the region

在这里，我们有一些相似的东西——不愿聘用获得中东地区研究学位的美国人作为公务员。因为他们可能会过于同情阿拉伯国家政权。在布什当政期间，这是非常常见的。而且这些被雇佣的官员还一直被政府隐藏着。别认为这是一派胡言。美国政府已经忽视了人们对该地区的知识和经验，宁愿人们对它一无所知。



coleman

all you need to know about japan's view of the west
can be learned from a ride on the tokyo subway or
a train.
if the last empty seat in the car is next to a westerner,
it will stay that way.
empty.

你想要了解日本人民对西方的态度，

只要坐上东京地铁或火车就能了解到。

如果车厢上的最后一个空位刚好在一名欧美人旁边，

那么它会一直保持原样。

空着。



Hieu Nguyen

Corporate Americans can try to disrespect or reject their seniors' ideas, and I am sure that the same treatment would follow as it did for one of the people mentioned in this article. I do not think Americans with foreign degrees are favored in this country either.

在公司里，美国人可以对他们的上级无礼，或者拒绝上级的要求。我确信，如果这篇文章中提到人们中有一人能获得这种待遇，相同的待遇也会相继出现。我认为获得了外国学位的美国人也不会愿意在这样的国家工作。
http://www.ltaaa.com/wtfy/4783.html

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正文翻译
TOKYO — Ronan Sato, a graduate student in applied statistics at Oxford, has always been keen to work in his native Japan. But at a careers fair for overseas Japanese students, he found that corporate Japan did not return his enthusiasm.

In meetings with a handful of Japanese financial trading firms at the forum in Boston last November, none would offer him a job without further interviews in Tokyo.

So Mr. Sato, who received three offers on the spot from non-Japanese corporations, accepted a position in Tokyo with a big British bank.

“I really wanted to gain experience at a Japanese company, but they seemed cautious,” he said. “Do Japanese companies really want global talent? It seemed to me like they’re not really serious.”

Notoriously insular, corporate Japan has long been wary of embracing Western-educated compatriots who return home. But critics say the reluctance to tap the international experience of these young people is a growing problem for Japan as some of its major industries — like banking, consumer electronics and automobiles — lose ground in an increasingly global economy.

Discouraged by their career prospects if they study abroad, even at elite universities, a shrinking portion of Japanese college students is seeking higher education in the West. At the same time, Japan’s regional rivals, including China, South Korea and India, are sending increasing numbers of students overseas — many of whom, upon graduation, are snapped up by companies back home for their skills, contacts and global outlooks.

“Japanese companies here are missing out on the best foreign talent, and it’s all their fault,” said Toshihiko Irisumi, a graduate of the University of Chicago Booth School of Business and former Goldman Sachs banker. He runs Alpha Leaders, a Tokyo-based consulting firm that helps match young talent with employers based in Japan. “They really need to change their mind-set.”

A United States-born graduate of Brown University who has a dual citizenship in Japan, one of about 12 foreign-educated Japanese nationals interviewed for this article, said she was told she “laughed too much” in interviews for a technology job in Tokyo.

Others with Western educations recall being treated with suspicion by Japanese recruiters, who referred to them openly as “over spec” — too elite to fit in, too eager to get ahead and too likely to be poached or to switch employers before long.

What is more, Japanese students who study overseas often find that by the time they enter the job hunt back home, they are far behind compatriots who have already contacted as many as 100 companies and received help from extensive alumni networks. And those who spend too long overseas find they are shut out by rigid age preferences for graduates no older than their mid-20s.

In a survey of 1,000 Japanese companies taken last June on their recruitment plans for the March 2012 fiscal year by the Tokyo-based recruitment company Disco, fewer than a quarter said they planned to hire Japanese applicants who had studied abroad. Even among top companies with more than a thousand employees, less than 40 percent said they wanted to hire Japanese with overseas education.

That attitude might help explain why, even as the number of Japanese enrolled in college has held steady at around three million in recent years, the number studying abroad has declined from a peak of nearly 83,000 in 2004 to fewer than 60,000 in 2009 — the most recent year for which the figures are available from the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development.

In some ways, the Japanese snubbing of Western graduates is a testament to the perceived strength of their own universities, seen by many here as more prestigious than even the best American and European schools — despite mediocre showings in various global college rankings.

At American universities, 21,290 Japanese students were registered last year, fewer than half the number a decade ago — even though the overall number of Japanese enrolled in college has been constant, at around 3 million. American universities last year had 73,350 students from South Korea, which has less than half of Japan’s population,

“There is an awareness that Japan’s competitiveness is falling, and we need a more global work force,” said Kazunori Masugo, head of the Senri International School in western Japan and a member of a central government committee on education and training. Lessons at Senri are taught mostly in English and the school sends a handful of students to colleges in the United States and Europe each year.

“But the environment in Japan is such that if you go overseas to study, you have to be prepared to go your own route, find your own way,” he said.

Ryutaro Sakamoto, who paid his way through the University of Toronto and returned to Japan at age 30 with a business degree, found he was too old to apply through standard recruitment programs. He sent résumés to the likes of Panasonic and Sony, anyway, but never heard back. Eventually, the Japanese unit of the American insurance company Prudential was happy to put his bilingual skills to use.

“In Japan, taking the time to study overseas sets you back in the shukatsu race,” he said.

“Shukatsu” refers to the system in which Japanese companies typically hire the bulk of their workers straight from college and expect them to stay until retirement. Not getting a job upon graduation is seen as a potential career killer.

So competition is fierce. In the last three years, the percentage of new graduates in Japan who found work was the lowest since the government started collecting comparable data in 1996. As of Feb. 1, with two months left in the recruiting season, a fifth of students in their final year at college had yet to find jobs.

“Shukatsu is like Kabuki theater,” said Takayuki Matsumoto, an Osaka-based career consultant. “It’s difficult when you don’t fit the template.”

His advice to returnees: don’t be too assertive or ask too many questions.

Kenta Koga, one of only a handful of Japanese undergraduates to enter Yale in 2010, violated many unwritten rules last summer as an intern at a big Japanese advertising agency in Tokyo. On client rounds with his boss, who was advising on trends in technology or social media, Mr. Koga, a computer science major, felt the urge to speak up.

“Some of what they were discussing was old or plain wrong,” he said. But he was careful to steep his language in the appropriate honorifics reserved for elders. “I’m terribly sorry to interrupt,” he said he would murmur. “My deepest apologies if you already knew this.”

Still, his supervisors were annoyed. “You are being too scary and preventing other people from speaking,” one boss said, according to Mr. Koga. On another occasion, he said, he was censured for crossing his arms in front of senior colleagues. He was eventually excluded from meetings and assigned seemingly dead-end tasks. He now says he would never work for a Japanese company.

Some Japanese companies have made a point of reaching out to returnees. U-Shin, an auto parts maker, attracted attention in February when it placed a prominent ad in Japan’s largest business daily offering twice the normal starting pay to candidates with overseas degrees.

“We plan to expand aggressively overseas, so we need recruits who were themselves bold enough to go overseas,” said Koji Tanabe, U-Shin’s chief executive.

But U-Shin seems the rare exception. The Japanese financial giant Bank of Tokyo-Mitsubishi more closely fits the norm. Each year, it hires about 1,200 fresh graduates. Usually, fewer than 20 have studied overseas or are non-Japanese, said Keiichi Hotta, a recruiter for the bank.

“We’re cautious because we emphasize continuity and long-term commitment to the company,” he said. “Especially in finance, we don’t want people who are focused on short-term gains.”

No wonder some returnees play down their exposure to Western ways. Norihiro Yonezawa, who studied for a year at the University of Maryland, said he did not emphasize overseas experience or English skills when he interviewed — successfully — for a coveted job at Panasonic.

“I didn’t want to come across as a show-off. So I stressed how I worked hard and overcame that,” he said. “And I made sure to emphasize that I would still fit in.”



东京——Ronan Sato是美国牛津大学应用统计学院的研究生。他一直想要学成回国，报效祖国；但日本的公司却没有录用他。最后，他只能到东京的一家英国银行上班。他感叹道：“我真的很想到日本公司汲取经验，但他们似乎很谨慎。日本公司真的想要全球化的才能吗？我觉得他们对此并不重视。”

众所周知，一直以来日本对海归的态度就很谨慎。一些评论家指出日本的这种态度将会和它的一些重点工业问题一样日益严重，导致其在经济全球化中处于不利地位。受此影响，越来越少日本学生愿意去国外学习。相反，中国、韩国、印度则送越来越多的学生到国外学习，这些留学生一毕业就被国内的大公司争相聘请。

日本人真的需要转换他们的思维方式。

本文采访了大约12名海归学生，其中有一名学生因在面试过程中“笑得太多”而遭到拒绝。其他海归学子回忆，他们经常被面试官用怀疑的眼光看待，或直接对他们说他们“超过规格了”——这样的精英不适合这工作，太急着升职，很容易被挖脚或很快就会离职，自己当老板。另外，海归学子人际关系有限，得到的帮助也很有限。而且常在年龄问题上遭到拒绝。

去年六月就公司的招聘计划采访了1000家日本企业，其中只有不到四分之一的公司愿意雇佣海归学子。就算是员工超过一千人大公司，也只有不到40%想要聘用海外留学生。因此，近年来在海外学习的日本学生人数剧减，从2004年的83,000 到2009年的60,000.从一定程度上说来，日本人冷落海外学子是因为他们本土的大学有所发展，甚至比美国或欧洲最好的大学还要有名望。

Kazunori Masugo， 日本一家西方国际学校校长，同时作为一名公务员，说道：“值得注意的是，日本的竞争力正日益下降，所以，我们需要一支更加全球化的劳动力。”“但从目前日本的就业形势来看，你如果去海外学习，那么你可能要准备好走自己的路，找到你自己的方向。”

在日本，人们认为在外国学习最终会让你在shukatsu竞赛中失利。Shukatsu指的是日本企业的招聘模式——直接从大学招聘，然后希望员工一直工作到退休。如果，在毕业前还没找到工作，你的职业生涯很可能还没开始就结束了。所以，就业竞争非常激烈。

“Shukatsu就像是找歌舞伎，一旦你不符合要求，那么进入这行就会很困难，”大阪的一位职业生涯咨询师说，所以，他对海归提出以下建议：不要过分自信，也不要问太多问题。

Kenta Koga 是耶鲁大学的本科生，当他在东京一家广告公司实习时因违反了一些不成文的规定，而受到不公正待遇——不让他参加会议，尽把一些棘手的任务交给他。现在，他决定再也不要到日本企业工作了。

但也有一些企业也非常重视聘用海归，U-Shin 汽车零件制造商二月登出的招聘广告提出：将用两倍薪金聘请海归学子。但像U-Shin这样的公司还是比较少的。就连日本金融巨无霸东京银行也坚持标准，它每年招1200名应届毕业生，通常情况下，只有不到20个人是海归或外国人。它的一位招聘人员说：“我们如此谨慎是出于对公司利益的考量，我们不需要那些只关注短期利益的人。”

因此，一些海归在应聘时并不会说自己的留学经历。




评论翻译

Jerry

So how attractive would an American graduate of the University of Tokyo be to an American firm if the graduate wanted to return to the United States?

那么，如果一名在东京大学毕业的美国学生想要回到美国工作，他的文凭对于美国的公司有多大的吸引力呢？



kunosoura

Jerry, in recent years Univ Tokyo was one of the best engineering schools. Only top students need apply. Tuition was free. Competition was fierce. They were considered a national key resource. I don*t kno wif still true, but best schools are now in China and India. I assume Rensselaer Polytech is still a good school, if you have the money.

Jerry，近几年来，东京大学是最好的工科院校之一。只有最优秀的学生需要申请，而后免费就读。竞争非常激烈。他们被当做国家最主要的人才资源。我不知道这还是不是真的，但现在最好的学校都在中国和印度。我认为伦斯勒理工学院仍然是一所好的学校，只要你有钱去就读。



Ron Bannon

Japan's unwillingness to accept Western train bankers may be the only thing that will save them. What a disaster these dopes have proved.

日本不愿接受西方模式训练出来的银行家，也许这是可以拯救他们的唯一途径。这些笨蛋真是表现得一塌糊涂。



Sam

I agree. I was particularly struck by what Mr. Hotta said, that “Especially in finance, we don’t want people who are focused on short-term gains.”

我同意，Hotta先生说的话令我深受打击，“尤其在金融业，我们不需要那些只关注短期利益的人们。”



Shivaji Banerjee

It is not right or wrong, but people from Japan seem to be very inert (noble?). I have the fortune to interact with people from almost every culture and never found a close comparison. But to be on this topic, when Sony and Panasonic were ruling the world, were they more open to Western Grads? Maybe now they should seek admission in BRIC countries since that is The Next Market!

这不是对或错的问题，但是日本人似乎非常懒惰。我很幸运，有机会与来自不同文化领域的人进行交流，但从未能好好比较他们的差异。但在这个话题上，当索尼和松下统治全世界时，他们不是反而对西方毕业生更加开放吗？也许，他们现在应该寻求机会进入“金砖四国”，毕竟他们是下一个“世界市场”。



Greenpa

It is hardly a new problem. Gosh- an old established organization is resistant to change from outside? Whodathunk?!
Sounds like a terrific business opportunity for me. A couple of returning whiz kids should open a business in Japan - offering rehabilitation training for returning whiz kids: "How To Be Japanese Again". Couldn't fail!

这已经不是一个新问题了。Gosh 是以前成立的一个组织，极力反对从外部开始改变、

对我来说似乎是一个极好的商业机会。几个从海外学成归来的优等生可以在日本开一间事务所——为海归学子提供回复训练，让他们学会“如何再次成为日本人”。绝不会失败！



Markham Kirsten,MD

The strenght in the United States intellectual life is our ability to assimilate into our melting pot the intelligencia of the world. Seen as a weakness at times, that we do not have enough room in our own universities, we welcome with open arms those with a university degree. The insular countries like Japan, and the Moslem world who protect their own entrenched elites, fail to import the talents of others and deprive themselves of this resource.

在美国与一批知识分子共同生活的经历，成为让我们融入世界熔炉的优势。有时，我们的公司没有足够的空间去容纳每个学生，这是我们的劣势所在。但我们还是会竭诚欢迎那些大学毕业生。像日本这样的岛国以及MSL世界，只会保护地位牢固的精英阶层，不能引进其他人才，使他们自己丧失了大量的人力资源。



Richard

While this may be true for entry level positions in Japan, it is definitely not the case for experienced employees in certain businesses and professions. In law, the area I am familiar with, Japanese law firms, companies and government agencies strongly encourage their employees to come to the United States for graduate programs. In fact, in many cases they finance the student's educational expenses here and support temporary family relocation.

在日本的入门级职业来看，这可能是真的，但对于那些在特定商务或行业经验丰富的人员来说，绝不是那么回事！在我所熟知的法律领域，在日本律师事务所，企业和政府机构极力鼓励他们的员工到美国上研究生课程。事实上，在许多情况下，他们会为这些学生担负学习经费，并且短期内会为他们安置家庭。



Don Seekins

Note that most of the Japanese who study at places like Oxford or Yale are probably pretty well-off, and that the "system" in Japan is in the end discriminating against a rather small number of high-flyers, while the people who stay home - the vast majority - are benefiting from an admittedly imperfect situation. Japanese culture emphasizes loyalty and modesty. After reading an article today on Donald Trump, I wonder if we couldn't learn a little from them?

既然大多数在牛津或耶鲁学习过的日本人都可能变得相当富裕，而且日本的那套“体制”最后还会排斥那些抱负极高的人；另外，那些留在国内的大多数人还能从公认不完善的体系中受益。日本文化强调忠诚以及谦逊。今天，读了一篇关于唐纳德·特朗普的文章，我就想难道我们还不能从他们身上获取教训吗？



SD

"Especially in finance, we don’t want people who are focused on short-term gains.”
I take the article's point, but that part sounds exceptionally reasonable...

“尤其是在金融业上，我们不需要那些只关注短期利益的人。”

我抓到了这篇文章的重点所在，但那部分听起来还是非常合理的。。。。



Ricky Barnacle

Any proof at all of a correlation between an "international" education and competitiveness?
And if this type of education means bringing Wall St. and/or Madison Ave. strategies to Japan, no wonder they're saying "No thanks", based on the current condition of the world economy given to us by these MBA know-nothings.

根本没有相关证据能够证明“国际性”教育与竞争力之间的关系。

而且，如果这种教育类型能够为日本带来华尔街或麦迪逊大道的战略模式，根据这些无知的工商管理学硕士给我们的当前的世界经济情况，也难怪他们会说“别见外”了。



Daniel

Taking a good look at the current state of the US and European economies, why exactly would they want Western-trained graduates? Maybe they ought to take a lesson from the US Congress on "how to get things done" too, eh?

好好看看美国及欧洲的当前经济情况，为什么他们只招到在西方学习过的毕业生呢？也许他们也需要向美国国会学习一下“如何做好事情”，对吧？



Kei-bon

The article cites the drop in the number of Japanese studying at US universities as evidence of chauvinism, but surely Japan's extended recession is largely to blame. And don't the higher numbers in the past suggest that experience studying abroad has been perceived as an advantage in the job market?

这篇文章引用在美国大学学习的日本学生人数的减少作为沙文主义的证据，毫无疑问，这都要归咎于日本不断扩大的经济衰退形势。另外，过去有比较多的学生在美国就学并不是暗示说海外留学经历能够让你在人才市场上取得优势。



Chi

I am not sure America or Europe are in any position to be lecturing anyone on the 'state of their economy'. It really is the height of arrogance to suggest there is something wrong with the Japanese system for preferring local graduates. I should note most Americans do not venture out for degrees and many American companies essentially discriminate against those with foreign degrees.

我并不确定美国或欧洲有立场就“他们的经济情势”对任何人讲道。提出日本偏爱本土毕业生的体制存在问题，这本身就是一件非常骄傲自大的行为。我注意到大多数美国人都不会出国求学，而且很多美国企业基本上都排斥那些拿着外国学位的人。



Siobhan

You raise some very good points. There are American companies that will only look at US graduates of certain universities, and circular file the others.

你提到了一些很好的点。有一些美国企业只聘用某些大学的毕业生，而不看其他学校毕业生的情况。



Nyongesa

Japan has been in a two decades long economic funk, known as the lost decade, for which there seems no end. If you were to read the Japanese press you would see it is an major obsession of there's to discuss. It has nothing to do with arrogance.
On your second point, there's not a country in the world with as many foreign born nationals at top managerial positions, than in U.S. firms. There is a massive influx of international students into U.S. universities, who are then hired into U.S. firms at unprecedented levels. I know many dozens of Africans with senior responsibilities in U.S. firms, who's equivalent classmates in Europe have reached nowhere as substantial.

日本已经经历了二十年的经济恐慌，在迷失的十年间，恐慌似乎永无休止。如果你看过日本新闻界出版的读物，你就会看到主要讨论的还是沉迷问题，与骄傲自大毫无关系。

另外，世界上再没有哪个国家的公司高层管理人中外国出生的侨民数会比美国公司的还多。有大量的留学生进入美国大学，然后这些学生就会以前所未有的水平被美国公司雇用。我知道许多非洲人在美国公司中担任要职，他们的同窗在欧洲也取得了实质性的成就。



JimBob

To oversimplify a bit: Japanese companies want their employees to be slave/robots. The influence of the West with all its notions of individuality and personal freedom is antithetical to this relationship. A tainted employee might start giving others ideas about passive deference to superiors and acceptance of rote work assignments.

简单来说：日本企业希望他们的员工作为奴隶或机器人。西方世界个人观念及人身自由理念的影响与日本企业的理念是相对立的。一个人一旦被同化，就会开始建议其他人被动服从高层人员，接受一成不变的工作安排。



Kyzl Orda

We have something similar here -- there is reluctance to hire Americans who obtained Middle Eastern Studies degrees for government jobs. The idea being they may be too sympathetic to arab regimes. This was common during the Bush era and those hiring officials are still pocketed in the government. Nevermind that this is malarkey. The government has overlooked experience and knowledge in favour of lack of knowledge of the region

在这里，我们有一些相似的东西——不愿聘用获得中东地区研究学位的美国人作为公务员。因为他们可能会过于同情阿拉伯国家政权。在布什当政期间，这是非常常见的。而且这些被雇佣的官员还一直被政府隐藏着。别认为这是一派胡言。美国政府已经忽视了人们对该地区的知识和经验，宁愿人们对它一无所知。



coleman

all you need to know about japan's view of the west
can be learned from a ride on the tokyo subway or
a train.
if the last empty seat in the car is next to a westerner,
it will stay that way.
empty.

你想要了解日本人民对西方的态度，

只要坐上东京地铁或火车就能了解到。

如果车厢上的最后一个空位刚好在一名欧美人旁边，

那么它会一直保持原样。

空着。



Hieu Nguyen

Corporate Americans can try to disrespect or reject their seniors' ideas, and I am sure that the same treatment would follow as it did for one of the people mentioned in this article. I do not think Americans with foreign degrees are favored in this country either.

在公司里，美国人可以对他们的上级无礼，或者拒绝上级的要求。我确信，如果这篇文章中提到人们中有一人能获得这种待遇，相同的待遇也会相继出现。我认为获得了外国学位的美国人也不会愿意在这样的国家工作。
http://www.ltaaa.com/wtfy/4783.html