#215 Jobs that "Utilize" English

(Note: This article was originally written in Japanese with the Japanese-speaking audience in mind)

Do you use English on a regular basis or are you thinking of using it in the future for your work? I would like to share my experience of becoming bilingual and what I hope it will be some good metaphor for some of you.

As I think I shared quite some time ago, I was not in a real English environment until I was 12 years old. One day, when I was in 6th grade, my parents told me that I would be going to an international junior high school, and suddenly I was in an English-only environment.

My parents, especially my mother, wanted me to have a broader perspective in life.

I remember that at that time, the number of Japanese people going to international schools was still very small.

With this background, the reality was not so easy.

The environment was such that all subjects were suddenly taught in English.

With the Japanese school calendar ending in March, entering international school in April meant I was suddenly thrown into the end of the school year with many final exams.

There was an English support program at school, but it was too fast for me to catch up.

So I had my mother and a private tutor to support me, and I vividly remember that for about a year I cried every day because I could not even do my homework.

The picture is of me and my little sister at that time. You can kind of see the stress in my face, not wanting to be have to repeat a grade.

I think it was during the latter half of my high school years in the US that I thought I had finally developed a good English foundation for myself, and continued onto complete my 4-year bachelor’s degree at a college in New York.

When I entered the workforce in Japan after college, I inevitably found myself in a workplace where I had many opportunities to use English.

In Singapore, I worked with people for whom English was a second language.

Through these experiences, I have come to feel that I can practically "make use" of my English skills.

I believe that it is not simply about being able to speak the language, but about deep communication and a sense of mutual feeling that goes beyond that.

Nowadays, it is easy to translate a language without human intervention, such as through automatic interpretation.

However, I feel that beyond that, negotiations and complex interactions are becoming more and more important in the corporate world (and beyond).

I believe that this links to what my mother was talking about when she said that she wanted me to have a broader perspective.

As a Japanese person, how do we make the best use of English as a tool?

Or is there something else that you would like to be able to utilize more in your work?

The weather in Japan has suddenly turned into an end-of-the-year climate in the past few days.

I wish all of you, including those from other countries, a week with at least one more smile!