Tag Archives: Emily Erickson

Understanding Japanese Business Etiquette

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This past Fri­day, I inad­ver­tently observed a key tenet of Japan­ese busi­ness eti­quette – and vio­lated another – as I skid­ded into Michiko Yamashima’s pre­sen­ta­tion on Japan­ese Busi­ness Eti­quette almost twenty min­utes late.  I had sprinted over to the Career Ser­vices office after an exam ran long, and slid into a back row, bend­ing for­ward and inclin­ing my head to duck into a seat. I had per­formed, in essence, a hur­ried form of the Japan­ese indi­ca­tion of respect and sin­cer­ity, the お辞儀, or for­mal bow.  I neglected, how­ever, to appear in full West­ern busi­ness attire, dark suit and con­ser­v­a­tive shoes included.

These ges­tures – for­mal bow­ing, and the obser­vance of appro­pri­ate attire—are but two of sev­eral impor­tant Japan­ese busi­ness cus­toms to be observed in cor­po­rate sit­u­a­tions. Why are these ges­tures nec­es­sary? And why should we Prince­to­ni­ans famil­iar­ize our­selves with their impor­tance? Just as Amer­i­cans expect for­eign­ers to greet us with a firm hand­shake and jovial grin, so too do Japan­ese busi­ness­men and women antic­i­pate com­pli­ance with a few basic cus­toms as a show of mutual respect.

In a busi­ness set­ting, junior employ­ees should take their seats clos­est to the door, and take care to avoid the most com­fort­able chairs. Women take a rel­a­tively sub­servient role, and cus­tom­ar­ily serve alco­holic bev­er­ages and other drinks to their male coun­ter­parts. Resumes intended for use in Japan should include the applicant’s age and passport-sized photo.  If noth­ing else, how­ever, the fol­low­ing three aspects of Japan­ese busi­ness eti­quette should be observed:

  1. Bow­ing is more than a neck exer­cise.  Western-style hand­shakes span the spec­trum from wet fish to bone-crusher; bow­ing, too, requires prac­tice and pre­ci­sion. There are three lev­els of bows, Yamashima explained: the least pro­nounced an infor­mal greet­ing, the mid-level appro­pri­ate for busi­ness meet­ings, and the third, deep­est bow reserved for apolo­gies. When bow­ing to an asso­ciate, keep it slow and mea­sured, and make sure to main­tain eye con­tact at the begin­ning and end of the gesture.
  2. Busi­ness card pre­sen­ta­tion is a form of art. In Japan, busi­ness cards, like credit cards, are treated as exten­sions of peo­ple them­selves. Busi­ness cards are typ­i­cally exchanged between all par­ties present at a meet­ing, and are pre­sented and received with two hands. The recip­i­ent is expected to briefly inspect the busi­ness card, indi­cate admi­ra­tion with a brief nod, and pro­vide their own in return. Trav­el­ers to Japan should arrive fully stocked with busi­ness cards – it is not uncom­mon to hand out 100 cards in a sin­gle week!
  3. Dress for suc­cess – con­ser­v­a­tive, sub­dued suc­cess.  West­ern busi­ness attire is com­mon­place in most Japan­ese cities, and both men and women should dress in dark suits with dark ties, socks, panty­hose, and shoes, as appropriate.

Yamashima’s mes­sage, while most use­ful for those antic­i­pat­ing a career in Japan, is applic­a­ble to all stu­dents seek­ing future employ­ment: do your research, and pay atten­tion to the cus­toms of your workplace.

How to Launch a Career in Communications

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Adver­tis­ing. Com­mu­ni­ca­tions. Mar­ket­ing. Media. If you’ve ever seen an episode of Mad Men, these words con­jure images of a fast-paced world full of seduc­tion and intrigue, a fas­ci­nat­ing view of the col­or­ful cap­i­tal­ism that dom­i­nated the spirit of the 1950s and 60s. The busi­ness sounds glam­orous, the work stim­u­lat­ing, and the fash­ion cut­ting edge—but what exactly does a career in Com­mu­ni­ca­tions entail? What does it really take to break into the indus­try in the twenty-first cen­tury? Career Ser­vices invited the fol­low­ing phe­nom­e­nal panel of Prince­ton alums to answer these ques­tions and more in the Careers in Com­mu­ni­ca­tion Panel held ear­lier this month.

Meaghan Byrne ’10 (Reli­gion), Social Media Ana­lyst, NM Incite, a Nielsen McK­in­sey Com­pany;
Justin Cahill ’11 (Eng­lish), Edi­to­r­ial Assis­tant, W. W. Nor­ton & Com­pany;
Chelsea Carter ’08 (Psy­chol­ogy), Account Exec­u­tive, SS&K;
Lau­ren Clabby Moore ’00 (Eng­lish), Free­lance Pro­duc­tion, CNN;
Lau­ren Cowher ’10 (Anthro­pol­ogy), Account Exec­u­tive, Edel­man;
Chris­tine Miranda ’08 (Soci­ol­ogy), Inven­tor, ?What If!

As you can see, the Com­mu­ni­ca­tions field isn’t strictly lim­ited to advertising—alums work­ing in adver­tis­ing, broad­cast jour­nal­ism, pub­lish­ing, pub­lic rela­tions, and social media all stepped for­ward to offer their exper­tise. Some entered the work­force directly after grad­u­a­tion; most combed the employ­ment list­ings for months before land­ing a job. A few have remained with the same com­pany for a num­ber of years; oth­ers have tried on mul­ti­ple firms for size until they found a per­fect fit. All are pas­sion­ate about their work, and fully invested in help­ing cur­rent Prince­ton stu­dents under­stand what it takes to jump­start a career in Communications.

  1. Here are a few nuggets of their col­lec­tive wis­dom:
    Intern­ships are the best entry into the field.  Most firms in the com­mu­ni­ca­tions sec­tor have (unpaid) sum­mer intern positions—and they typ­i­cally hire directly from their intern pool when look­ing for new hires! 
  2. Do your research. It’s just like col­lege applications—there’s noth­ing worse than assur­ing the Har­vard admis­sions com­mit­tee that you’ve been des­tined to attend Prince­ton since the day you were born. If you’re apply­ing for a social media posi­tion, hav­ing a Face­book page alone isn’t a suf­fi­cient qualification—read indus­try pub­li­ca­tions, and stay updated on cur­rent events. If you’re inter­view­ing for a PR firm, know what field—arts, health­care, tech­nol­ogy, etc—you’re most inter­ested in.
  3. Pay your dues – a good intern makes a bet­ter boss.
    Interns in the broad­cast jour­nal­ism and tele­vi­sion indus­tries often find them­selves shared between a num­ber of depart­ments, so they are afforded extra oppor­tu­ni­ties to net­work within the com­pany.  If you’ve put in the time learn­ing the ins and outs of your firm, you’ll be poised to step into any open posi­tion. Even those charts and spread­sheets are worth it — after all that time plug­ging data into Excel, you’ll be much more able to super­vise and sup­port your own future employ­ees and interns.
  4. It’s all about the con­nec­tions – and your abil­ity to cap­i­tal­ize on each and every oppor­tu­nity. Most of the alums agreed that it’s not enough to have a stel­lar resume and GPA. You need some­one in the com­pany to hand your infor­ma­tion directly to the HR depart­ment.  What’s that? Don’t know any­one who works for NBC? Can’t think of a fam­ily friend writ­ing for the New York Times? Don’t worry! The Prince­ton Alumni Careers Net­work is a data­base of nearly 5000 Prince­ton alumni just wait­ing for a stu­dent to reach out and con­tact them. On that note…
  5. Don’t for­get to take the ini­tia­tive! One alum­nus admit­ted to apply­ing to every sin­gle job list­ing for a sin­gle com­pany until they finally con­tacted, inter­viewed, and hired her.  If that’s not quite your style, cold-call a few alums, and try a pleas­ant follow-up email if nec­es­sary (see Career Ser­vices’ Career Plan­ning Guide for some help­ful guidelines).
  6. Once you’ve got a foot in the door, don’t rest on your lau­rels. It helps to know some­one within the com­pany for that first hire, but most firms are staunch mer­i­toc­ra­cies.  They don’t care where you went to school; they care how you per­form on the job.  If you’re hired young for lit­tle pay, stick with it and work your way up through the ranks. You could be surprised—in most pub­lish­ing houses, interns start off read­ing lots of “slush” (man­u­scripts sub­mit­ted by aspir­ing writ­ers). But, as Mr. Cahill ’11 noted, “I hear you’ll lose a lot of faith in good writ­ing everywhere…but if you find that gem and sign that book, your career is made!”
  7. It’s okay to shop around. If you don’t find that next Great Amer­i­can Novel, or you’re oth­er­wise unhappy in your cur­rent posi­tion, don’t hes­i­tate to look into other oppor­tu­ni­ties. Rival com­pa­nies might love to steal new, young tal­ent from their com­peti­tors, and firms in other indus­tries might rel­ish your unique skillset.

How do you launch a suc­cess­ful career in com­mu­ni­ca­tions? In short, take ini­tia­tive, con­tact an alum, nab an inter­view, and work your way up through the company.