Whenever I work with Japanese companies such as Sharp, they require everything in paper since they mention it needs to be faxable.
Why do so many Japanese companies stick to slow and antiquated communication medium? Things that can be done electronically in 5 minutes takes significantly longer but I don’t see much upside to doing things this way.
As a person working for a US company, it’s an annoyance that always comes up when I am working with Japanese companies. It really creates barrier for us to do business with Japanese companies because of it. If there are other equally competitive vendor, I would most likely choose them over Japanese vendors which is a shame.
https://www.reddit.com/r/japan/comments/123o3bc/is_there_a_legitimate_reason_why_japanese/
8 comments
Old workforce not wanting to adapt to progress for the most part. Senior is always right even when he’s clearly not. And, of course, the “natural” way of doing things.
It still works for the job it was meant to do.
Also, paper records can be a lot safer than an electronic database. One phishing E-mail can compromise an entire company’s records, whereas a thief is unlikely to carry off ten truckloads of paper records.
Here is your answer:
https://www.japantimes.co.jp/news/2022/09/19/national/japans-graying-population/
Many of these people don’t have smartphones. Some don’t even have computers. Fax machines remain the easiest way to contact them barring direct phone calls.
Risk averse. I am working for a Japanese company ( leaving in 3 weeks) and management just doesn’t forgive mistakes. They would rather go to endless meetings, get a general consensus from everyone then move ahead if 1 person disagrees the Earth stops spinning.
Our bosses still prefer us to print out everything on A3 sheet and present it to them at certain signing time of the day because they say, watching details on a paper carefully is much better than signing electronically off a laptop screen. There was time when I proposed we move to sign most of documents on ipad using Adobe acrobat, the idea got shot down so quickly I was embarrassed.
Younger generations are much better tho, I will be joining a Japanese start up which believes in digital transformation and takes inspirations from Tim Browns Design Thinking, we actually joked a bit a about fax machines and floppy disk during the interview.
Probably to keep the paper, ink, and fax machine industries alive.
My wife does some accounting for a company and they fax over all their spreadsheets which she then has to reenter into the accounting software.
No way I could do that work cause I’d go crazy with how inefficient it is.
Computer > printer > fax machine > printer > retype into computer
Legal certainty may play a role. If a piece of paper is stamped with a “hanko”, you can definitely use it in front of a judge. Emails are so easy to fake that they might not offer the same security if push comes to shove.
I guess, first the legal framework will have to change, and that’s not so easy. Not that long ago, Japan still had a cyber minister, who had never used a computer. Technologically, Japan has a long way to go until it arrives in the present.
US companies still use fax machines. It’s more secure than email because you can’t hack faxes without physically being there.
From my experience, i know 4 reasons why
1. Old population that are not be comfortable with using smartphones or computers
2. Conservatism that prefers to avoid mistakes and stick to the familiar ways of doing things
3. Bureaucratic Culture that values paper documents and stamps of approval (hanko) over electronic communication
4. And also a large number of small and medium-sized enterprises that dominate the business landscape and are conservative in adopting new technologies