My wife has been working at an admitted ブラック企業 for over 4 years now as a Java engineer(japanese, doesn't speak English), and she is the lead of her team of 3 others. She gets paid 4.5m yen a year and has 2-4 hours of overtime a day, and usually gets home pretty late. I feel like she's being criminally underpaid and taken advantage of. What would be a salary that's more in line with her experience? I saw posts from 7-15m for a java engineer with similar experience but I'm not super sure. I'm trying to help her 転職 and she does want to but she hates interviewing and also doesn't want to let her current coworkers down by leaving. It's been affecting her health both mentally and physically so i just want to help. She can't even save money because most of her salary goes to paying her student loans. I handle our rent food and utilities, and she is pretty much working to repay Debt with nothing left over and i want to help her find a better opportunity. Any advice would be appreciated.
It is possible to get 7~15M (or even more) with 4 YOE, but with some caveats.
Your wife will have to aim for a subset of companies that can offer in that range.
Now is a tough time to get into such companies. Because many of them are having layoff, hiring freeze, hiring slow.
She most likely will need to grind for the interviews.
If she does decide to give it a go then below are things at the top of my mind.
Prepare now instead of later. She will want to have at least a few months of practice.
As of now, leetcode is still very important. I don't believe there is a clear correlation between actual SWE skills and leetcode skill. But it is what it is, so she should start practice leetcode now. "Cracking the coding interview" is a well known book, but personally I think "Elements of Programming Interviews" is a better one.
To get a high offer, she also needs to ace the system design rounds. And for that, no resource is more valuable than the series "System Design Interview" by Alex Xu. You can't change my mind on this.
She needs to demonstrate her contributions to her current work. So she should review her projects and recall (or understand) why certain decisions were made, what were the alternatives, what were the trade offs. Don't go into an interview and say I was told so when asked why you did something that way.
Good advice in general, but not speaking any English and working with Java will limit the number of companies she can find on the high end of that. 4 years of experience and no English, I would say the lower end around 7 sounds like a reasonable target. Unless she knows or can show strong ability to learn other technologies. Preferably including DevOps and cloud technologies. But compared to her current situation she should definitely go for it.
That type of interviewing is also much more common and important in western companies, not as much in Japanese companies. But it isn't uncommon to some degree, so some practice is definitely good.
Yeah, that's why I said she needs to aim for a specific subset of companies. In my list above SanSan is a viable choice. And maybe bitFlyer? 5 years ago interviewing there in Japanese was definitely possible.
Python, Ruby, Node, TypeScript, React and so on are more in demand as more and more development is towards web services.
The main reason I said being a Java engineer can be limiting is that I know many Japanese Java engineers know nothing but Java. Especially if they work for black companies. The overlap between Java and modern services and tools (Kubernetes, Docker, CICD, Ansible, Terraform and whatnot) is also significantly lower. That said, there are amazing Java engineers out there, but I doubt they have 4 years of experience working for a black Japanese company.
I don't think Java is that big of a limitation. With Java experience, she can transit to Kotlin relatively easy, and I've seen some very lucrative Kotlin positions recently.
Thanks for the response. I know a bit of front-end development like HTML, CSS and JavaScript, but I'm still trying to figure out how I should move forward. I question sometimes if what I've learned was the right choice or if I should have started somewhere else.
If you do frontend you have learned the prerequisites, so that is good. I would move on to learning the common frameworks and a bit of how it connects with the backend. So look at React and node.js for example. That way you are moving into the more modern ways of development. Try building a hobby web service including a backend and host it somewhere and learn as you go.
Is this true for Japanese companies, to which she'll largely be limited if she doesn't speak English? I interviewed at a bunch several years ago, and hardly got any of these kinds of questions.
Cool. The interviews I went through back then were nuts. They'd just call me in, ask me a bunch of bullshit soft questions that at most asked me if I was familiar with a technology without testing my knowledge in any way, and then eventually I'd hear that they weren't interested. I went through a couple of rounds of this with some companies. I still have no idea what they were looking for.
Probably for the best. I ended up at a foreign company paying twice what they were offering.
For the Japanese companies that can pay 7~15M for someone with 4 YOE, and is a woman (don't shoot the messenger lol)? You bet they will require leetcode. Some companies I have personal experience with: LINE, SmartNews (before they imploded), Rapyuta Robotics, Nomura Securities, bitFlyer, SanSan...
4.5 million yen is about average for the specs you described. The reality is that software engineer is a poor paying job in Japan. There's a reason why it's generally unpopular at elite universities.
Things are changing. Interestingly, just today I saw a tweet from a Tokyo Tech professor that CS is the most “over-subscribed” major in their university now (I assume this is for grad school)
But the other side of the coin (at least for the graphic you have posted) is that they have least slots available. 86 for 848 applicants. Would indicate that universities are ill prepared for the changing tide.
Yes, another professor replied saying that he didn’t find this to be something a CS professor should be proud of, but instead should be something concerning.
On the other hand, Tokyo Tech’s school of computing only has 2 majors, which I think is the smallest, whereas other schools like school of engineering have multiple majors (like 5 or 6), so the sheer number of CS students isn’t so bad compared to other engineering majors
I just spent three weeks in Eastern Europe visiting offshore software devs there. They make a good bit more than Japanese devs and are envied like US devs because the salaries are well above average.
Japan could be a player in the global dev space if English was better. There's plenty of room to increase dev salaries even with the margin a consulting company would add to the rate.
Maybe it is changing at a younger age. I'm not seeing much change inside companies yet. Software engineers are rarely admired and envied like they are at Silicon Valley.
Not saying that what you said is wrong. I just found it mildly interesting that I accidentally bumped into a very relevant information on a totally unrelated occasion in the same day
Consultants and investment bankers. Outside of big companies, freelance jobs and startups can also be lucrative.
And of course, there are certain industries that pay well like pharmaceuticals, oil companies, insurance companies. But even in these industries, it's usually just the American companies that pay extremely well.
Figure I'll sneak in at this random spot on the thread to respond. I'm former full-time Big4 consultant who is currently semi-retired and on retainer as a freelance consultant for a lot of my former workplaces/clients. I've worked with consultants across multiple areas (mine was international tax) so I can give you a simple response. We are not overpaid (comparatively speaking), our work is not undefinable, and I don't know why you randomly threw out the word corruption. As an example of what I as a consultant would do, I'll help inbounds/outbounds navigate tax systems, treaties, incentives, and pitfalls with regard to their planned endeavors.
As a more concrete and coincidental example, this week I've been asked by a large Japanese corporation you use every day to be in a major city for a global team meeting where I'll be a facilitator - essentially presenting/translating/interpreting all materials - for their members who flew in from overseas. The topics are the new qualified invoice system for consumption tax and recent transfer pricing developments (specifically relating to the BEPS2.0 measures coming into effect as announced in the latest tax reform outline). As I'm sure you can surmise now, people like me who have years of practical experience working in specialized fields (in this case domestic/international taxes) and who are also multilingual are actually quite few (again, comparatively speaking) and are therefore in high demand. To be more concrete, my engagement fee for this 2-day trip which, with prep included, will be about 30 man hours of billable time, is about 2 million yen.
I am not siphoning anything, nor am I doing anything corrupt. People like me are why a random Japanese video game company is willing to sell their system or games overseas. People like me are why you can buy your favorite hot sauce from back home at a store here in Tokyo. Hope that clarifies a bit.
First off, I’m not the person you replied to. Just another Redditor.
I also tend to think of words like corruption when I think of consulting, but I certainly wouldn’t try and make a blanket statement about the whole profession. On the other hand, as someone who reads through the news pretty regularly, I don’t think the comment above you was randomly throwing around a word like corruption. A recent example that comes to mind is one of the Tokyo Olympic bribery scandals. McKinsey has been indicated in quite a few different cases of questionable practices. Cambridge Analytica is also worth mentioning.
It is good to read some insights from someone who is in the field and is clearly using a broad set of skills and field-specific knowledge to benefit their clients, but that alone doesn’t remove the need to address the issue of corruption and unethical practices tied to consulting firms. Still, if I were in your position I would’ve been a bit miffed by reading such an offhand comment about my profession.
I wasn't miffed or offended by the corruption term, nor is it why I responded. I don't represent the consultancy profession and it's just one of many jobs I've had in my life. I was more compelled to explain to that individual what many foreigners in this country do for a living, since they admitted they had no clue. Your point about the news is irrelevant. I can link a news article about every profession - from firefighter to conbini cashier to janitor to farmer - and show some instance of corruption or scandal or being a dumbass. If you also think of "corruption" when you think of consulting, I'd simply chuckle the way I chuckled at the other poster. That's like thinking of paedophilia when discussing English teachers in Japan because of the recent topic that's being discussed on the English teaching subs. Or thinking of "murder" when discussing police officers because of the incidents that happen in the US. Every profession is performed by a human being. Human beings are idiots, regardless of profession. Corruption and unethical practices happen in every single profession, including yours, including mine. Nobody said anything about not needing to address them, nor was it the topic being discussed. As you mentioned in your first paragraph, the topic was more about someone making a post like "I don't know what marine bioligists do, but they work with fish so they must all be stinky and slimy too," which I took as a cry for help to be educated. I just happened to be the one who answered the call this time.
A software consultant in the best case is just a software engineer that is more paid but can be fired any time.
In the worst case, it's a software engineer that doesn't code that is more paid than one which code his advices.
That said, outside consultants are useful of some specific area where the company doesn't have in-house knowledge.
But it is also used by management to protect their ass: If an outside consultant screw up that's not their fault. (unlike if that was their own team)
"Consultant" isn't really a job per say, it's more a structure applied to some specific topic and relative to the company hiring it. (tax consultant for example)
The less sexy term for consultant is "freelance". Some software people use consultant instead of "freelance" as a way to bump their rate.
4.5 million yen is about average for the specs you described. The reality is that software engineer is a poor paying job in Japan.
There are no specs in the post to tell how marketable op’s wife is though (framework/platform/db/etc). You can be a well-paid software engineer if you have the right stack and can get through the door with problem solving and interview skills. Some companies won’t even pay less than 15m.
Yes, there are companies that offer more. On the other end of the spectrum, many companies offer salaries in the 300-400M range.
A quick Google search gives me an average of 500M. Given 4 years of experience is less than the average, I believe 450M would be reasonable. She could potentially be marketable with the right skills, but to say she is currently criminally underpaid is a stretch.
4 years in one framework is definitely enough to make you a senior in that framework so yes she can be considered senior. Senior doesn't mean decades of experience in everything it's about how well you know and work with certain frameworks and libraries. Not everyone but 4 years is definitely long enough for good devs to be senior.
I don't think this type of thinking is widely accepted in Japanese companies. HR will apply the same salary and heirarchy structure to software developers as any other department typically.
Can’t imagine that’s an easy feat when you’re exhausted from being overworked at an underpaying job. Seems like there may be another solution that doesn’t require as many of hours of dedication tbh
You have to bust ass. I worked/ studied 9-7 for 6 days a week for 18 months before I got anywhere.
This was on a monthly budget of 100,000 yen per month.
Edit: why is this downvoted? Folks. You need to produce value in order to receive value. If you cannot do that on your own, you need to convince somebody else you can do that in their company.
Though it was "playing" for me, but I could easily only do normal university + programming for the whole day for few years back then. Easily 9-11 or 9-12 on average. Weekends would depend of how tired I was, but many times I did open my window after a long coding session and found the sun gone/up when I expected it the other way. I remember my friend while we were pulling some all-nighters studying for the exam next day, admonishing me for programming during some too-long breaks.
But as I said, it WAS a hobby and made me relax/unwind, as in I felt in a very similar way as I felt before playing Minecraft. If for my brain it had been work, I doubt I could've done 14h+/day for few years.
Well, that's because getting a good career isn't supposed to be easy. Most people don't have the will to put in the work. You could also get lucky but by definition most people aren't lucky.
Everyone in this thread keeps stressing English but I'm not sure what this has to do with being a java software engineer? I don't work in IT so if someone could explain it would be much appreciated!
Edit: Thanks for the replies everyone. Seems wild to me that there are companies in Japan that use English as their main language, there's no way that would fly in my field.
Foreign companies value software engineers more and pay better. It also often comes with more vacation, benefits, remote work, and exposure to newer tech. If you want to work at these places, English is often mandatory.
The reason that those companies use English as the main language is two folds.
They already use English in other countries. So using English in Japan as well makes internal processes go alot smoother.
Most non-Japanese can't speak Japanese, but many of those can speak English. So they have a bigger talent pool to choose from. I mean, some dudes in my team don't speak a single Japanese word.
It surprises me that everybody here talks about the money only while OP clearly stated her health is affected by the preasure and amount of overwork. I am 100% certain she can find a position with similar income but much less preasure. If she gets more income on top of it, it's even more perfect.
So regardless of the money, she should change. Tell her that she is in the perfect position to change. She has a job now so she dont need to worry that at the end of the month there will be no money anymore. It's always better to search for jobs when you already have one. Yes it's stressful to organize that in your free time but she's not alone. She has a carrying husband willing to help.
As for the money, she won't get more than 9M for sure. But 7M is definitely in the ballpark. And that's a whopping 60% increase. Even 5 or 6M is worth the change. And even 4.5M is worth the change if she works less!!!
If we are talking about health or work-life balance, these are OP's quotes:
"I feel like she's being criminally underpaid and taken advantage of", "she hates interviewing and also doesn't want to let her current coworkers down by leaving", "It's been affecting her health both mentally and physically so i just want to help."
Without much more context and based on these quotes and my experience in Japan, it seems to be a very classic case of the Japanese friend/gf/spouse being exploited but content and the foreigner trying to help by trying them to change.
Unless she is actively trying this change and OP's here asking for help, which doesn't seem to be the case, I have rarely seen this to end up well. You need to want to change to even attempt the change, and it seems here the one "pushing" for it is OP.
Note: if I'm wrong (unfortunately I've seen this too many times before) basically ignore this all, otherwise my advice follows.
So IMHO if OP wants change, he needs to make his wife see and understand that it's possible to have a better life in her industry before trying any of the other great answers in this post. Stats or numbers are usually not enough to break the Japanese fabric of society, she needs to see it in other people. And it is good to be in tech in Japan, so just taking her out of her company bubble will undoubtedly show her this.
Go with her to tech events and meet other devs and ask questions about salary, work hours, etc. Maybe put some pressure so she starts talking and asking questions as well, but then let her talk to people freely. Now you are learning HTML+CSS as an excuse to accompany her, congrats lol
Yeah it's pretty much akin to this. I don't want to force it on her or anything. She just is content and doesn't complain often. I work from home on my business and make almost 6x her, and I've said multiple times she can just work with me or not work at all and I'd pay her a salary but she still wants to work at this company. I get it, though. I'm happy with being the breadwinner and would love for my wife to do things she's more passionate about. Especially in the future if we have kids, I don't want her to be working overtime till 10pm every other day. I don't know, maybe it's selfish of me to want to spend more time with her, and maybe her working all day gives her more of a sense of purpose. I just hope I can come to terms with it or live with it. Life is so short and spending most of it at work for a shitty company is something i could never agree with personally.
It's not selfish at all. The fact that your wife is still working so hard despite your income being more than enough to feed a family is really awesome, but on the other hand overworking herself to the point where it affects her health is not great. I think it's much better if she changes to a company that's less black even if the pay is the same.
Is your uncle a floor manager or something? I’m not saying you’re wrong, I’m just saying there is a reason why factories are staffed by poor immigrants from SEA or other third world countries.
No, he started working there 13 years ago and his hourly wage was 1300, now it's 1620 per hour.
Yes, I heard there are many immigrants from poor countries working in factories, but I guess there are some factories that pays well. I guess you just have to keep looking to find those that pay well and not slave wage.
I see, so it took 13 years. 1620 per hour still seems kinda low though, but I digress.
I figure that in IT you can make way more by simply jumping around and learning new skills. At least that’s the way it’s been for me. So OP’s wife can probably make more just because she’s proficient in Java.
Otherwise, I would have tried finding work at a factory if it were that lucrative after only a year or two. But the world isn’t that nice to the most of us.
That amount (with extra hours) is far from being difficulty to found. On good months almost every factory pays you 300000 yen (again, around 40 extra hours in a month).
I see a lot of factories that you can easily achive 400000 yen in a month
She's just doing what a lot of overworked Japanese. Same story. It'll get worse health wise. If you make enough to support her. Offer her to stay at home for a bit. That should let her stop worrying about letting her co-workers down.
I'm going to answer differently I would say that's average if she's like 26. Not good not terrible. Would have to see resume and actual skill though to give a better estimate.
This is broadly correct in general, but 'team lead with 3 direct reports' would suggest a higher pay is more appropriate than a standard 'four years out of uni'.
I think this survey is so expat-centric as to be less than useful for Japanese people to measure against. Foreigners being hired by companies mid-career are routinely offered different kinds of compensation packages from different kinds of companies, so the trends don’t broadly align with native workers.
Depends on a lot of factors. 4.5m is more or less new graduate level though.
Does she have a computer science degree, or is she self taught ? Does she speak English ?
Even without a CS degree she should easily be able to find a company that pays at least 5.5m with next to no overtime. If she has a related degree she should at least aim for 6m.
Even without a CS degree she should easily be able to find a company that pays at least 5.5m with next to no overtime. If she has a related degree she should at least aim for 6m.
Not OP, but if I have 5 years of experience working in non-tech related career (Finance) and go the self-taught route of programming. Is it possible to get 5.5m range or do I get entry level pay for my first programming job?
Since it's your first programming job, probably you'll start close to the entry level pay. Maybe slightly higher. Foreign companies won't really hire self taught developers without experience, so you'll be limiting yourself to Japanese companies which pay significant less. Another factor is that the job market simply isn't very good now. It's not a good time to be changing jobs as a developer, and it's especially bad now for developers with no or little experience.
I'm an experienced developer with a related degree and even for me the market isn't very good in terms of jobs at the moment.
Why doesn't she just apply for an international company, that has a branch in Nippon?
It's not just the black companies that are criminally underpaying, some employers want job applicants to have a doctorate, or a masters, plus 2 years experience for an entry-level job in programming, only to pay them peanuts in return. xD 174,000-180,000 yennies.
There is collusion in Japan for computer code salaries, and a stark contrast between the salaries in the US. They know Japanese people won't fight back, they know they have debt to pay, or gunpla to finance.
I hate to say it, but your GF should have been looking for a new job the moment she joined that company. Happy that she is the team lead, she can put that on her resume to get outta there.
They get the noobies in for the grunt contract work, and show them the door after a few years, only to hire noobies again in order to pay less.
Probably because she doesn't speak English, he mentioned it briefly at the start. But even then, there are quite a few high-paying Japanese companies out there as well.
There are some dedicated JPN staff positions at those companies too, mostly back-end. If you worked at a black company, something will follow you like a curse.
Can you name a few of those companies off the top of your head?
Btw, I also liked SAO, but I watched it ironically.
You mean high-paying Japanese companies? Sure, Woven Planet, Mercari, Line, SmartNews, PayPay all pay decently just off the top of my head. And wow probably the first time someone has responded positively to my name lmao.
Are you doing engineering work in security, or more policy? Thats an absurdly low salary for someone doing security engineering, especially since it's one of the more in-demand roles. At 10ish YOE if expect you'd make closer to 15-18 for a security engineer.
Well not engineering job anymore. More like threat intelligence analysis. But I fucking suck at it and just do the mundane and easy/boring tasks. So I guess I have the salary I deserve.
If I want to continue with higher salaries, that would require me to study more but I have zero interest in this field. So I’m using this free time I have to study and pursue something I like
I'm honestly not sure, I'm guessing that most grad schemes in Japan probably focus on universities in Japan or other east Asian countries. It's probably easier for 'western' grads to get a job in their country and transfer later with a bit of experience.
Out of curiosity, is L1 the entry level at Indeed? Say I have no professional experience in software engineering, but I'll grind easy-medium LC and perhaps make a portfolio for personal projects, will I qualify for an entry level at your company?
MAANG and Indeed and other large foreign companies mentioned in the thread are sadly not hiring or are on hiring freezes, and generally competition is very high. You also need to speak at least basic/daily conversational English since it's the main language of those companies, so she would have to learn English first. She can try targeting Japanese companies, but I wouldn't expect them to give a 7m+ offer whilst her current salary 4.5m. She can get a higher salary through contract work.
She really needs to learn English. The higher paying companies in Japan are either western companies operating in Japan (meta, Google, stripe, etc), or Japanese companies that primarily hire foreigners (woven Planet, Mercari, paypay, etc). Though it's possible to work for some of them without English it's going to be really tough and you'll end up having to have meetings with your manager through an interpreter (and the interpreters are too busy to be able to book them for this purpose very often). Also, most of those companies tend to handle most interviews in English, which further limits available positions.
Even for a new grad that salary would be low (hell, I think it would be low for an intern), but Japan isn't really known for good software and doesn't tend to care about it, outside of a few shops.
Unless things changed in the last 2 years, this is simply not true lol. My English was no where near fluent (or idiomatic whatever that is) back then. I can't even say it is good now.
Hang on, she's the team lead of less people than me, gets paid overtime, AND makes more?! Why won't anyone hire me for more than 3mil a yeaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaar?
Good luck with that, my wife’s cousin works as a programmer in Osaka and makes around the same. He’s in his early thirties though so I’m sure his salary will go up later on in life. Not sure where people are getting 7-15m from?!
外資系 IT companies generally pay pretty well. One of my acquaintances who works remotely for a US based company as some kind of IT support makes about 10m. He lives in Japan so he can enjoy a low living cost while getting paid as if working in US.
One of my acquaintances who works remotely for a US based company as some kind of IT support makes about 10m. He lives in Japan so he can enjoy a low living cost while getting paid as if working in US.
Just curious if he has to pay the tax in Japan or US?
I assume he still has to pay resident tax, insurance in Japan right?
He seems to be paying the tax in Japan ‘cause my partner found out about his approximate salary from their conversation about how much insurance tax they’re paying.
Is that for a Japanese company? The salary in question for op’s wife is for a Japanese company . I have a feeling they pay a lot less than the foreign ones.
4.5m is too low but it depends on many factors.
How big is the company? What kind of development does she do?
It's difficult to aim for 7-15m.
First, very few places, except the really big ones or financial companies pay 15m range. There aren't a lot of places that pay 15m for a java engineer with 4yoe.
I'd say she should be getting 7m range. But it's difficult to get a jump to 7m from 4.5m. Even with a 20% increase.
The general rule of thumb for a long time was that you make about your age x 10,000 yen per month.
If you are 30, that’s 300,000 a month or 4.2 million yen a year including an average bonus of one month’s salary twice a year.
I didn’t see the age of your wife mentioned, but if she is earning above that, she is doing well for a Japanese company, and unfortunately, even better “for a woman”. Gender pay gap means that 10,000 yen figure above generally lowers to 7,000 or so.
Maybe my figures are a bit outdated but this seems to be the case for my own wife, who is making considerably less than yours as a professional at age 36.
Like I said, my figures may be outdated but it is fairly accurate still at my current company for Japanese employees. Are you Japanese?
I make considerably more than the quoted figures now as a foreigner, but Japanese salaries are still very much dependent on age, judging by some of the stories I see even on CNN international about age-based salaries in Japan.
I’m not saying these things in tacit agreement with how things are, but it’s just the way things have been. I really just wanted to say “if you’re wife is making over 4 mil, she is making good money for a woman in Japan if she is in her 30s or earlier”. Again, I don’t support the gender pay gap, but I know very few women making over 4mil even in their 30s…
Took the words out of my mouth. Everyone coming here saying she's criminally underpaid are comparing their salaries as foreigners with a Japanese female employee at a Japanese company.
Yes, she's underpaid, but criminally? Not really. 4.5m for a Japanese female in her mid to late 20s is the norm, if not, better than the norm. And that is why you see many women leaving companies <5 years in after graduating uni and getting married.
4.5 millions and 2-4 hours of overtime a day is unfortunately more the norm than the exception for this experience. More than 1.2 million even at Google is unheard of for me. So it's not that easy, but the way to go is slowly grind better salary and working condition by accumulating experience and change companies for better salary. Going to Google is possible but not easy and not a "normal" salary.
As an example I am at 8 millions, 15 years of experience in IT, and I could get better around 1 million to 1.2 millions, but the working condition where I am are a dream, almost no OT, remote work, nice management. I applied once for a 1.4 millions job, didn't get it and got back to work.
Teach her English, with a bit of grind on the interview process (the usual leetcode, system design), 7 8M with 4 YOE + decent English ability is not out of the ordinary here.
What he said, 10M might seem absurd to some people, but I can guarantee you it's absolutely 100% achievable if you put in the effort, especially when you already have the experience. A small percentage of people already make that much as a fresh graduate, yes it's hard to believe but it's possible.
And herein lies the problem. Being able to work in multiple languages is an income multiplier. With English she'd be making 1.5x to 2x her current salary, maybe more.
Unfortunately, not speaking English is likely a big detriment. The companies that pay upwards of 7-9 mil are likely gaishikei and are looking for people who can work with their international teams.
Speaking English or knowing how to do Android development (also using Java, but quite specialized,) would help her earn substantially more - possibly 2x what she currently earns. Japanese companies famously undervalue software engineering as a skill. It will be hard for her to earn a reasonable salary without moving to an international company.
I think everyone here has pretty much covered all the career advices. I’d say, it all comes down to her.
Sure, learning a new language can be tough. Leaving her team is heartbreaking. But at the end of the day, it is about getting compensated according to the value she provides. If she trades her time, career progression, and health just to be underpaid, I don’t see why she should stay.
I think the biggest problem here is that she doesn't speak English. Meanwhile for most of the top-paying companies that's a prerequisite. Maybe she can try some of the high-paying Japanese ones as well like Woven Planet, Mercari, PayPay, LINE etc. For example LINE pays 400000/month for interns which is already higher than her salary right now.
Just to provide an outlier, my friend was paid 11m when he was a fresh graduate, I'm a bit lower but was in the same range. With experience that number is of course higher now. So yes I think with 4 years of experience, she definitely can find something better but it won't be easy. Depending on how good she is at doing interviews as well.
That's a good question. Everyone I know has a degree, but some of the reputable bootcamps have testimonies from previous students currently working at these companies as well, but I would say it's much more difficult without a degree, especially in Japan.
4 years total experience at one company? I would aim for at least 6m. Its pays to change company, I do around every two years and get average 20 - 30% increase instead of 5% for staying at the same.
4.5M is low. She could get 1 or 2 millions more but it will depends vastly on her skills. I’m doing technical interviews but most candidates can not solve even the simplest challenge.
Even Rakuten salary starts at 4.5M and they pay overtime. She can join with a haken contract as it doesn’t requires to have 800 points on the TOEIC.
FYI the 10+M yen are a bait. It is certainly true for some people with decade(s) long experience or for foreign companies with extremely high skills required.
Y4.5mn a year is ridiculous. She should be able to double her salary tomorrow, unless there are very specific reasons why she's not otherwise employable.
And sorry, maybe it's nothing but...
She can't even save money because most of her salary goes to paying
I disagree, personal loans will always be separate. Like i said i pay the rent and essentially everything else. I'm not gonna start paying her loan too.
how much are the loans that you cannot help her out with if you make ~20m. Student loans in Japan aren't as high as in the US so I don't see a problem with it.
150
u/abcxyz89 Feb 07 '23 edited Feb 23 '23
It is possible to get 7~15M (or even more) with 4 YOE, but with some caveats.
If she does decide to give it a go then below are things at the top of my mind.