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Making English Work / No escaping paperwork
Yoko Mizui Daily Yomiuri Staff Writer Putting English aside, what surprised Noboru Yamamoto, 58, during the first five years after he joined a foreign company in London from a typical Japanese firm in Tokyo were the differences in business practice. "The amount of documents differs greatly. In an international company, almost all messages and reports are delivered through documents or e-mails," said Yamamoto, who worked for the International Maritime Satellite Organization (INMARSAT) from 1985 to 2002, experiencing the transition period when the organization became a British private company, Inmarsat Ltd., in 1999. "Basically, it's always necessary to make an appointment with a colleague if you want to discuss job-related issues with them, even if they are a subordinate," Yamamoto said. "It really made me aware how British-style business is based on individualism and fulfilling your contract. The Japanese style of changing the rules according to the occasion doesn't work. Also, rules are made through open discussions in open meetings, not simply handed down by superiors." Yamamoto had got used to reading a lot of English documents after his previous company, Kokusai Denshin Denwa (KDD), now KDDI Co., sent him to Boston to get an MBA. But he still found the amount of documents he had to read as a manager at INMARSAT enormous. "I had to read a lot of documents sent in from everywhere, and write reports myself. It was common to write about 20 pages in one half of the day, and to then hand them out to other staff," he said. He also had to write a lot of papers for conferences, and the overall quantity of reading and writing came as a real shock. "The linguistic ability required at international companies is quite high," he said. In the process of getting an MBA in the United States, he thought he had learned to speak English fairly well. "But, three or four years after I joined the company, my colleague from Singapore said to me, 'Noboru, you can finally speak English,'" he said with a smile. "British colleagues often joked about my English by saying 'Your English is better than my Japanese,'" he added. Yamamoto stressed the import!ance of promoting yourself when working in a foreign company. "In Japanese companies, it is often the case that 'the nail that sticks up gets hammered down.' But in a foreign company, one should aim to stick out," he said. He said it took about five years to get used to this and other aspects of British business practice. Born in a small village in Yamaguchi Prefecture, Yamamoto never thought he would use English in his future job when he was a child. But it was a remark by his English-language teacher at middle school that first interested him in English. The teacher, who had returned from studying as a Fulbright scholar in the United States, casually recommended that he study in the United States if he really wanted to learn about the wider world. "His words somehow stuck in my head and I thought I would have to study English if I wanted to go to the United States," Yamamoto said, recalling that he listened to an English program hosted by Toru Matsumoto on NHK radio every day when he was a high school student in Hiroshima. After becoming a law student at Tokyo University, he joined an English program sponsored by the Japan Federation of Economic Organizations. At a seminar house in Hachioji, in the suburbs of Tokyo, students lived with an American couple for a few weeks and studied English intensively. "Although some students improved their English considerably, I could not," he said. Even after joining KDD, he attended an English language night school at his own expense. He became the company's first employee to be dispatched to the United States to get an MBA. He studied at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology's Sloan School of Management and was awarded the degree in 1981. "As the number of students at the business school was small, it had a real family atmosphere," he said. But it was a tough two years for him. Although he lived in Boston with his wife and their twin sons, he had no time to take care of his family due to the amount of work he had to do at the school. He had to read a lot for the classes, but "it was for studying, not for writing," he said. "British people know how to write reports as they learn the necessary skills at school, but we don't usually learn that at Japanese schools." This made lessons on writing at a pre-session before starting the MBA program quite helpful he said. As a manager of the INMARSAT section developing the international market for satellite telephones in aircraft, Yamamoto represented the British side in negotiations with Japanese companies. From this he learned how import!ant language ability is in business negotiations. "International business negotiation is a kind of linguistic wrestling or boxing. Unless one has a good command of English, one will be defeated in the battle," he said. "Negotiators should know every trick and technique when discussing business." Yamamoto said that he had observed how the attitude of the British negotiators changed when they were dealing with a really good Japanese translator. "To make discussions go smoothly, one needs respect from the other side. Speaking graceful and dignified English is vital to get that respect," he said. "In British schools, they put a lot of weight on speaking. Public speaking is sometimes taught from primary school level. Education and business are closely related," he said. After quitting INMARSAT, Yamamoto started Orience Consulting Ltd., a Japan-Britain business consulting company based in Reading, England, in 2003. And his main advice for people who would like to work in international business is this: "It's best to see studying English as a way to understand how foreign people think and do business. The language reflects how people think." * * * This column features interviews with professionals who use English in their jobs, experts and others interested in the language in the hope of offering insights into learning the language. Readers are invited to offer themselves as candidates to be featured in this column or recommend an acquaintance. E-mail dy-edu@yomiuri.com. (May. 4, 2007) |