Moved to Japan and failed – a “wolfy”(WSO user) story
A “wolfy” story for you (famous WSO user). I graduated from a public ivy in Economics (doing financial modeling during college) then got myself a one-way ticket to Japan to study Japanese. I thought that if I could get Japanese Fluency on paper (JLPT 1) I would at least be able to get a back office job at a bank in Japan, if not anything.
During the course of all of this I went to literally all the career fairs in Japan during the last few months, taking trains and shinkansen all over the country(saw Mount Fuji looking out the window when it was covered with snow), even took a 20 hour plane ride back to the US for the Boston Career Fair for bilinguals, still ending up with nothing. It’s painful to put in 2 years of hard work, and hours and hours into late night study of a language only to end up with nothing.
Hours and hours spent on cover letters written in both Japanese (which would literally take 6 hours for one) and English, Preparations for interviews all in Japanese, memorization of accounting terminology in Japanese, all for nothing.
My absolute low point was when a 5-person company asked me if I went to a 2 year school or a 4 year school(they basically had no idea about US colleges), or have a non-Japanese person tell me during an interview that my Japanese wasn’t good enough.
Is it possible to break into banking for non-Japanese? I’m very lost at this point and have tried everything, from Recruiters to bilingual websites, coming up empty handed.
If anyone can offer some guidance I would be very thankful and be indebted to your help.
Come back home and do an MSF. Or network here for a job. Can I ask why the fixation on Japan?
please tell me that over the course of these 2 dreadfull years you banged a few Japanese hotties
I don't think you understand that in order to do banking, you need absolute fluency. As in like if I gave you a book to read, you should be able to confidently write a 2000 word essay in japanese. Not that you actually are going to produce 2000 word essays in banking but that's the level of fluency you're going to need.
The only way I can see that you can work in japan is if you try to enter via sales and trading, particularly trading where language proficiency is not very important. Check M&I for more info on that, there is a direct 1on1 interview with a guy from Stanford who spent 2-3 years in Japan doing trading.
And yes, you should have at least banged a few Japanese chicks in those schoolgirl uniforms. Bring a shaver as well - noone wants pubic hair haha
^^You are going to be reading s-1's and other things that are just as hard, if not harder to read than a book.
I went to boston career forum this year and got both BB IBD offer and M/B/B consulting offer. I have never been to Japan in my entire life. I really don't know how good/bad your Japanese is but it seemed like Boston Career Forum was almost like the easiest way to get an offer...
Are you still in Japan laresia?
...why would a japanese bank hire a gaijin fresh out of college? Not sure it was a great strategy to move to Japan in the hopes of getting a back office job. I would try your luck in the US if you're absolutely set on working for a bank, but you've done yourself no favors.
I feel for you, but at the same time I think you're crazy to be doing this and I'm surprised no one tried to stop you earlier... move back to the states and get some experience-- if you're dead set on Japan wait until you get higher up and have top experience so you have something to bring to the table. And look on the bright side - at least if you really are fluent (or close) in Japanese now than you can write that on a resume and it won't have been a total waste of your time.
Assuming you have a good gpa and went to an okay school you'll probably be able to spin the 2 years studying language abroad in a positive way and get an analyst gig or something.
You could have used up all that hard work to get somewhere here, back in the states. Not that getting a job there in Japan isn't possible, but it just seems way harder and more of a burden on you.
Dude, at least when you interview in the US you'll have something cool to talk about... Don't talk about your lack of finding FT work - rather talk about the experience....
I feel for you, dude. I do hope you bagged a couple of chicks indeed...
Have you tried Lincoln International? They have a small team in Japan and is US-based, maybe they'll appreciate your efforts.
Other than that... I would have to agree with the others. Firms in Japan want native fluency and it's an uphill battle because you're probably competing with a ton of Tokyo U, Keio U and etc. kids who have done well academically and have local internships. I knew someone who was non-Japanese that worked at a BB - but in S&T. I think he had some language skills, but not 'fluent'. Maybe that's an area to consider researching.
S&T at any BB in Tokyo requires little to no Japanese fluency, gotta couple guys I know who do this. Have you tried this route? Also. how're you getting your interviews? Headhunting firms in Japan are a lot more helpful for entry level positions compared to the states, I know this first hand. And consulting is hard as hell to get into in Japan, harder to get in than banking IMO. PM me, I'll see what I can do.
op have you tried going to a pokemon tournament ?
That sucks man, but as newbie2banking said; you now have a story to tell to showcase commitment/drive/whatever for interviews or b-school. Best of luck to you and yeah, I really hope you hit the noisy freaky schoolgirls there lol.
Thanks everyone, I’ve been blaming myself and coming up with all kinds of reasons for my failure - been running into the non-Native Japanese Speaker problem again and again, kind of makes me wonder how non-Japanese people get a job here in the first place.
Japanese schoolgirls, heh => more like the carrot and the stick…..
Kanon=> Thanks for the tip, I’ll try to get in touch with them and see how it goes.
Brownbanker=>PM’d you, any advice will help!
def a wolfy story. without finding a temp position (and thus "succeeding").
my advice is come back. i know a guy like you. very similar profile. as far as i know, he is still unemployed. the market is just tough for non-japanese in japan. then again, its tough for non locals everywhere. i don't see that many africans, mexicans, russians, europeans, etc in ibanking.
OP, did you take a time machine back to 1985? What made you think Japan was a hot market?
I tried to network with a MD in Tokyo while I was in a European office and he told me that they needed even more than fluency, something like geniune native Japanese skills and maybe the color of the skin that goes with it ... to know all the customs and habits...
Japan is one of the most homogenous societies in the world. Also you can't just move there and expect to he hired. All the immigrants work shitty fast food jobs and the ones that are in banking were transferred there by their company...
I hope you take this the right way, but you should really do more research into what is actually possible in Japan before you go through all that trouble of learning Japanese to get a job there.
I worked in S&T in Tokyo without speaking any Japanese, and tons of people do that in S&T at the foreign investment banks, as well as on the broker-side. However, in the past two years the vast majority of banks have migrated their S&T capacities (especially in equities) to HK and to a lesser extent Singapore. Tokyo is very quickly becoming extinct on the S&T side, to the point that only the cash business is still onshore. My opinion is that it is no longer possible for you to join S&T in Tokyo--there is very little foreign headcount there and it will be quantitative students from the top schools who get those roles. This does not appear to be your background.
Speaking Japanese as a foreigner is a good skill to have, but it is not the thing that will get you a job. Regardless of how good you think you are, I guarantee you that there are Japanese people who speak much better English than you speak Japanese. Moreover, it is very unlikely that they will ever trust you to learn kei-go to the extent that you can be put in any kind of serious Japanese client-facing role.
It would be best for you to get into a bank in the US and then try to lateral over in a few years.
So you decided that it would be easier to find a job if you go to a foreign country and become marginally fluent with the local language?
If this was your though process then honestly you are an idiot.
Hilarious. I actually laughed out loud. Dude, it's Japan in 2011, not some banana republic.
But seriously, there is a niche for gaijin in Japan. However, as many people suggested, S&T is probably the way to go at a younger level. If you come back to the US and pay some dues, then you will likely be able to get a job over there when you're older. I have a relative working in Japan for a PE firm, but only after working for US based companies and focusing on Asian divisions for several years. Someone suggested working for a firm that has interests in both the US and Japan, and that's probably a good route as well.
this thread was a total waste of my time. Can i have the last 8 minutes back?
Although the OP deserves a lot of hate for his harebrained plan, I gotta hand it to the kid: you've got a monster set of balls on you. Most guys wouldn't try to do this stunt but you dove in headfirst, and that does indeed take a monster pair.
^^ WORD.
if your dream is to be bankin' in japan, you have at least picked up the language and culture well enough for a good starting point. get some experience in the US, and then talk to your employer about transferring to Japan when you have some more cred.
On the flip side, we have a guy in my program here in the USA who is Japanese and speaks very rough English. The only explainable reason why he was admitted is because his company is sponsoring him and he has about 10 years of experience. I don't suspect he could ever get a job here (if he wanted) unless his language skills improved drastically. Good guy though.
Also, try Hong Kong/China if you want to be in Asia.
On the bright side, you have a great story to tell if you ever apply to business school. Talk about overcoming adversity or taking a risk.
lol i thought i was in bad shape. definitely use this in interviews. don't let 2 years go to absolute waste. and i third the hope that you banged 'some noisy schoolgirls'. good luck
i agree it probably wasn't the greatest plan in the world, but damn you had an adventure and now you can tell some awesome stories to interviewers. def have some big brass balls. i also hear the same thing about the japanese- very homegenous, and maybe even racist. the fact that you went there without anybody on the inside going "to bat" for you meant you had very little chance as an outsider.
Hey ibjhopeful:
By sheer coincidence I saw this while looking for the weekly Eddie/Midas show.
Send me your resume [email protected] -- let's see if we can get you an internship in Tokyo, HK, or Singapore.
Any work experience is better than none. Also, opportunities arise even outside of banking. Say you re an intern at Thomson Reuters or Bloomberg--the guy who's F1-ing you may like how you help him, hear your story out etc. Work at a consulting firm: your clients are BB banks. It's really the people you meet who will give you the job once you are past OCR (and even during OCR, the principle is the same). I've been given job offers in Singapore from my friends, while I have one. It is infinitely easier to get a job, when you have one. It is just a tragedy that some of us get stuck and never make it over the hump.
I went to the Boston Career Forum and so did my friend Jaime, who interviewed with Bandai (Jaime speaks almost fluent Japanese)--and this was in 09--no result. So, I understand. BCF is the easiest way to land a BB FT job, especially S&T Tokyo, in 3 days. But sometimes it just doesn't work out.
I hope you didn't go to Tokyo because of a girl, because that's just stupid. I did that. If you did--that takes balls. My mentor did that in 1985 (another down year), and he became the COO of Ogilvy Japan.
So let's see how bad you want it, but I've realized in hiring and helping others is that: people "wanting" it and willing to do anything sometimes don't on the job, and they forget how hard they struggled to get a job. I never forget this everyday I'm working. So I hope you can keep this attitude.
Anyway, the shitstorm is over for me; I know a lot of people now, and I want to help you. Send your resume and let's talk.
+1 just because omg who gives resume reviews to strangers. good luck to you both. ps wolfy your recommending-a-job-to-a-friend-landed-him-an-interview post inspires me once a month.
I'm a non-Japanese American currently working as an FX trader for a BB. I've been in Japan for six-years now, previously w/ long/short equity hedge fund, and prior to that w/ a BB that famously went under in 2008 (you can use your imagination). Let me provide a little prospective on how things have changed in the last six-years and some advice on how to approach your job search.
I graduated university back in 2005 when the economy was going gang-busters. Back then, if you came from a relatively respectable school with a quantitiative major you could easily grab several job offers at the Boston Career Forum with a western bank. Things are obviously very different now post-Lehman crisis.
Because corporate taxes are prohibitively expensive in Japan and because domestic growth has come to a standstill (I mean isn't there a problem when Moody's downgrades Japan's economy to negative watch to no market reaction?!) most western banks have pushed all non-Japan businesses to Hong Kong and Singapore. The hedge fund business has also shrunken significantly w/ only a few funds now w/ an onshore presence. In addition, it also doesn't help that private equity activity has been lukewarm w/ plenty of the megafunds flush w/ cash from the bubble-era but with lack of investment opportunities. As a result, many jobs that would have been available to you back in 2004-2008 don't exist anymore.
IB is out of your grasp IMO as it's still a very domestic business and requires native fluency. Plus, while we all would like to believe that in this modern age racism doesn't exist, business in Japan is still an old-school boys club. Finally, softskills are a major dealbreaker in Japan. Do you understand the proper mannerisms when doing settai w/ senior managers? Is your cultural awareness sharp enough to use the right keigo/sonkei-go based on seniority? Plenty of native Japanese don't even know how to use the right politeness correctly.
S&T is a much more reasonable expectation but comes w/ its own caveats. In my experience, the majority of entry S&T front office jobs go to two types of kids. First are the international kids of Japanese decent who went to international high-schooling (ASIJ, Saint Mary's) and then an Ivy-league hence their English/Japanese is perfect and have the pedigree to get their resume through HR. The second are smart domestic Japanese kids who went to top private elementary/middle/high-schools like Kieo, Waseda or the best public schools (Todai, Koyto). The former tend to work in more international related products, i.e. equities, fx, non-Yen bonds, etc. The latter tend to work in more domestic related products. In both cases, there is a strong alumni network of MDs that will go to bat for these new hires. Coming outside of this network puts you already in a distinct disadvantage.
The best way I would approach your situation is by initially forgetting about Japan and focusing on getting a job w/ a BB in the states with a strong presence in Japan. Then after 1-2 years try transferring internally. Several co-workers in my trading division have done this and some of them speak no Japanese. That said, they were transferred because there is a strong business need for their skillset. Furthermore, they were transferred on expat packages, so suffice to say their living accomodations and compensation was more than reasonable to compensate for the "cultural transition".
Hope this helps.
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