San is just like Mr.
I greet all my japanese counterparts Mr. in my emails.. they do
reply me san.
Anyway, all this greeting forms are just cosmetic, it doesnt really
add much value within the company.
Some japanese firms i visit often have their japanese FT in a more
technical or higher lvl positions.
Japanese people tend to be more mellow and shy in their
communication, because of this, Japs working in SG tend to prefer
working alone. Its sad most of them are loners..
perhaps due to their strongly xenophobic society.
English standards and communications tend to be horrible as they
read and write horrible english, u would have to reply in horrible
simple english too, so that they can understand.
I would say most japs working in Sg are quiet, reserved but super
super hardworking.
Its interesting, if you work in production, they may require u to
do morning warming exercise to relax and warm up the morning
muscles.
I find that they tend to be very tolerant on Chinese customs too,
of the 2 japanese companies i used to work in, both set alters of
chinese/buddhist gods at the back of the office building and during
7th month Chinese ghost festivals, we would set up tentages to pray
the ghosts and gods.
The big big jap boss would led by example to set joss sticks and
cut the roast pig.
CNY holidays tend to be as long, if not longer than other
companies.
They pay moderately good too.
2 things you probably can't stand about japs are their standards,
they are very reluctant to switch to international terminolgy, e.g,
ASME scales, accounting, units of measurements, etc, etc. This
stubborness probably made them lose out on the cutting edge against
USA and european competitors. most of the time i have to convert
this, convert that, translate this, translate that..
secondly is their horrible accented english.
But on the whole, very hardworking, dedicated and loyal.....btw,
rich too..
