Feeling isolated at my job

Hello everyone,

I'm not really sure what I'm looking for by posting on here, but I guess I just want to know if there's others who've gone through the same thing, if it's just going to be my experience as a foreigner here or maybe my company's the problem, idk, whatever. I just need to get it off my chest I think.

I currently work at a medium-sized company in Japan, primarily assisting with English communication on international projects. This includes talking with clients, translating and presenting reports, and other related tasks. I've been in this role for almost a year now, and I'm the only foreigner in my office besides a colleague in their 50s who I don't interact with much. I mention this because it only recently started to eat at me, when I became a full-time employee a few months ago.

Since then I've been feeling more and more isolated and pressured. Any misunderstandings that occur are often attributed to me, as if I must have misunderstood the Japanese communication, and I often hear, what I feel are passive aggressive "apologies" like, "I'm sorry for making you confused" when there was no confusion, just a misunderstanding for both parties. It's not that big of a deal but my bosses call me "resource" which… I don't like but I am not about to make a big deal out it since it's not like they don't use my actual name. There's like other little things too like when naming members of the team, I'm not part of the list, etc. It just makes me feel like… they just don't see me as one of them – which is starting to really get to me I think, and it's making me a little bitter about some of my interactions. Maybe it's a lack of effort on my part? Idk.

I have friends and such but I don't see them very often and when I do, I don't like complaining about work, I just wanna have fun with them and forget about it for a little while.

Has anyone else experienced similar? How do you handle being the only foreigner or feeling like an outsider at work? Any advice or shared experiences would be greatly appreciated

by nomimasen

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