A good friend of mine owns a corporation in Japan. He'd worked in the US for a decade or so before going home to start his own business, so he was in a pretty good position to compare the work cultures.
He said in Japan expectation #1 is you're at work for many hours. You show up before your boss arrives and you go home after he leaves, unless you're out drinking with him. Which is mostly mandatory - "My wife is sick" is an acceptable excuse. "I'm tired" is not. In the big companies the people from your college class at that company all get promoted as a group, so there's a whole lot of pressure from your college friends not to do (or not do) anything that will delay their own advancement.
But when you're at work you're not expected to look for things to do. Your boss will tell you when he needs you to do something. If he doesn't come by and give you a task it's perfectly reasonable to sit at your desk and do nothing. As an employer or manager you are not supposed to run your people ragged, either. My friend spent most of every morning going around to each employee and making sure they had something to do, but not so much it would reflect badly on him as an employer.
In the end he figured Americans and Japanese people get about the same amount of work done every day. The social dynamics are totally different, though. In Japan your work is like a second family.
There's also a sort of macho culture there, where as a salaryman you work incredibly long hours and deal with crazy commutes without complaining. And if you do complain you sort of lose social points.
He said in Japan expectation #1 is you're at work for many hours. You show up before your boss arrives and you go home after he leaves, unless you're out drinking with him. Which is mostly mandatory - "My wife is sick" is an acceptable excuse. "I'm tired" is not. In the big companies the people from your college class at that company all get promoted as a group, so there's a whole lot of pressure from your college friends not to do (or not do) anything that will delay their own advancement.
But when you're at work you're not expected to look for things to do. Your boss will tell you when he needs you to do something. If he doesn't come by and give you a task it's perfectly reasonable to sit at your desk and do nothing. As an employer or manager you are not supposed to run your people ragged, either. My friend spent most of every morning going around to each employee and making sure they had something to do, but not so much it would reflect badly on him as an employer.
In the end he figured Americans and Japanese people get about the same amount of work done every day. The social dynamics are totally different, though. In Japan your work is like a second family.
There's also a sort of macho culture there, where as a salaryman you work incredibly long hours and deal with crazy commutes without complaining. And if you do complain you sort of lose social points.