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I realized that we Japanese have lots of room for positive improvement and change. Japan will improve in the future if we can adopt a wider view of the world's business culture, and attitude towards English.
Hi, my name’s Tadakazu! Recently, I traveled to some foreign countries. My experiences were so exiting! So tonight, I want to talk about two big differences that I noticed between Japan, and the countries I visited: differences in attitudes towards business culture, and attitudes towards English studies.
But first, why did I go to these foreign countries? Well, I’m an accountant. I always study the account books of companies. Sometimes, there are things that I can’t understand just by studying accounts. So, I have to visit the companies directly. This time, I had to go to Vietnam and Thailand with my client. We went to check his subsidiary companies there. This gave me a chance to observe some important differences in business culture.
We had meetings with the president and the staff about the quality of their work. And we gave them some messages from their parent company. The president was Japanese. We had heard that he always monitored many indexes to control everything. And he said: “In order to control worker’s motivation, it is important to always watch them. If I don’t, they will sometimes be absent without permission.” I heard the same opinion in Thailand.
I thought that it was natural for workers to go to work at the regularly scheduled time. So I was surprised, and I noticed a big difference between their business culture, and Japan’s.
Everyone says that Japanese are too serious. That’s true, to a certain degree. Perhaps being able to struggle with anything in a serious way is one of the strategies of Japanese business culture. But I imagine that “Japanese seriousness” might actually be a bad point in terms of Japan’s business with other countries. Because I realized that it might be difficult for Japanese to continue working seriously in other countries that don’t have the same way of thinking! Anyway, that’s what I thought after seeing the situation in Vietnam and Thailand with my own eyes.
Next I’ll talk about Hong Kong, and the differences that I noticed related to the study of English. I went there with my friend. He is a flower artist, and he once lived Hong Kong for a short time. So he knew many things about Hong Kong, and introduced his favorite spots to me. After we arrived at our hotel, we went to the city to look for good yamu-cha places. While we were walking around, we asked many local people, because we didn’t have a guide book with us.
I was surprised, because everyone in Hong Kong we asked spoke to us kindly, using fluent English. Of course, they could also speak Chinese! So we could enjoy talking with many Hong Kong people.
I heard that the education system in Hong Kong is very strict. Thanks to their hard work, they were able to speak English before they graduated from high school! So many people there thought it was natural to be able to speak English. I wondered if it was because Hong Kong was once a colony of England.
They asked me why Japanese couldn’t speak English, even though they studied from junior high to high school, at least six years. I had no reply!
Anyway, I felt a deep feeling of power and energy from the local people. It was amazing! I also felt that everything in Hong Kong was logical: public organization, business style, and even the restaurant system. So I liked Hong Kong very much.
By the way, a lot of people say that Japanese people are too serious about studying English. They say that Japanese people focus on “correct” English too much. And that even thought English is a standard language all over the world, Japanese don’t focus enough on basic spoken communication. So, I thought that the Japanese people could learn some important English communication ideas from the people of Hong Kong.
Well, my trip was a wonderful opportunity! I realized that we Japanese have lots of room for positive improvement and change. Japan will improve in the future if we can adopt a wider view of the world’s business culture, and attitude towards English.
But let’s not wait any longer. Let’s take action now! First, let’s decide that we’ll “JUST DO IT”! Then, let’s try and spread our message of change to our friends. We HAVE to encourage them! After that, we’ll have a chance to influence people all over the world in business, and in our personal lives.
In fact, we will be A TOTALLY NEW KIND OF Japanese!
This is my dream! And I will work hard to achieve it. That’s why I am here tonight. Because I am looking forward to our future!
Thank you! Do you have any questions?
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Mayflower英語教室
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