Job postings tell you the stack. They don't tell you what Tuesday looks like.
This is what daily work is like on a Japanese engineering team, from inside one — plus the legal limits on overtime, what the statistics say about holidays, and the pay arrangement that surprises foreign engineers most.
The rhythm of the day
There is always a progress check. Some teams hold a morning stand-up; others do it at a different hour or in a different format. But at least once a day, somewhere, you will report where you are.
This isn't surveillance. It's the daily expression of hou-ren-sou (報連相 — report, inform, consult), which runs through Japanese work. Coming to that check with a clear, honest status — including problems — is a large part of how you're judged. Silence is read as trouble, not as focus.
If you're used to teams where you're left alone as long as the ticket moves, this is the adjustment: communicate more often than feels necessary, and earlier than feels comfortable.
How technical decisions get made
The pattern on my team, and on others I've worked with:
- An engineer proposes. Technical decisions start from the engineers doing the work, not from a manager handing down an architecture.
- Review is deliberate, and deliberately repeated. The proposal goes around for comment — often more rounds, and to more people, than engineers from other countries expect.
- Then it proceeds, with the decision effectively pre-agreed by everyone involved.
Two practical consequences:
- Getting a decision takes longer. Plan for it. A proposal that would be merged in a day elsewhere may take a week of circulation here.
- Once agreed, execution is smooth. The slowness buys consensus, so you rarely relitigate a decision mid-implementation.
How to work with this rather than against it: write your proposal down clearly, share it early, and ask specific people for comment rather than waiting for volunteers. Pushing a decision through quickly, over quiet objections, damages trust in a way that's hard to repair.
Overtime: the law, and the reality
The reality: overtime exists. How much depends heavily on the company and the project.
The law, since the 2019 reform (2020 for smaller companies), sets hard caps:
| Limit | Value |
|---|---|
| Standard cap | 45 hours/month, 360 hours/year |
| With a special clause (temporary circumstances) | Under 100 hours/month including holiday work; 720 hours/year |
| Multi-month average | 80 hours/month or less |
| Months allowed above 45 hours | 6 per year maximum |
Violations carry criminal penalties — up to six months' imprisonment or a ¥300,000 fine.
Source: MHLW — upper limits on overtime work (Japanese)
These caps are real and enforced, but note what they mean: a company can legally work you close to 80 hours of overtime a month for stretches. "Legal" is not the same as "sane". Ask about actual overtime hours in the interview, not just whether overtime exists.
Fixed overtime pay: the thing that catches people out
This is the one I'd flag hardest for anyone arriving from abroad, because most countries don't have it.
Fixed overtime pay (固定残業代 / みなし残業, minashi zangyō) means a set number of overtime hours is already included in your stated salary. A "¥6M" offer might mean ¥6M including 30 hours of overtime every month.
- You receive the fixed amount whether or not you work those hours — that part is in your favour.
- But your base salary is lower than the headline number, and the company expects that overtime to be normal.
- Hours beyond the fixed amount must still be paid separately. If they aren't, that's a violation.
What to ask before you accept:
- "Does this salary include fixed overtime pay?"
- "How many hours, and what amount?"
- "What happens to pay for hours beyond that?"
Job postings are expected to state the hours and amount. If an offer is vague about it, press until it isn't. More on reading offers in how much engineers really earn in Japan.
Paid leave: better than its reputation
Japan's reputation for unused holiday is out of date, though it's still below many countries.
In the most recent national survey, workers were granted 16.9 days of annual paid leave on average and took 11.0 days — a 65.3% take-up rate, the highest since 1984.
Source: MHLW — General Survey on Working Conditions 2024 (Japanese, PDF)
In practice:
- Since 2019, employers must ensure workers with 10+ days of entitlement take at least 5 days a year. Companies now actively push you to take leave.
- Taking leave is normal; taking it without notice is not. Flag it early, hand over your work, and it's rarely an issue.
- Long consecutive breaks are harder to arrange than in Europe. Two weeks off is unusual outside the national holiday periods.
What actually earns you trust
Pulling the threads together — none of these are about language ability:
- Report before you're asked. Progress, blockers, bad news especially.
- Write proposals down, and let review run its course.
- Deliver what you said you'd deliver, on the date you said.
- Be easy to work with. The team sees you every day, and that weighs as much as your code.
Summary
- There's a daily progress check in some form. Communicating early is expected, not optional.
- Technical decisions come from engineers, but go through heavy, repeated review. Decisions take longer and stick harder.
- Overtime exists. The legal caps are 45 hours/month standard, under 100 in exceptional months, with criminal penalties for breaches.
- Fixed overtime pay is the trap. Ask how many hours are baked into your salary.
- Paid leave: 16.9 days granted, 11.0 taken on average (65.3%), and at least 5 days is now mandatory.
This article is general information based on the official sources linked above and my own experience on Japanese engineering teams. Practice varies by company.
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Originally published at Honne Dev, where I write about working in Japan as an engineer — from the Japanese side of the desk.
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