Hi, I’m considering trying to get a new grad position at a Japanese unicorn as a SWE/data analyst/ml (mainly Mercari but others too). I’d like to keep my options open in case I don’t get into a decent tech company in my home country. If i receive an offer for tech consulting or non-dev work in my own country for example, would I be better off gaining dev experience in Japan if I were to receive an offer? (assuming it’s a decent company)
I understand that the chances are even lower to get a big tech position as a fresh grad in Japan than my own country.
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**Fresh grad at a Japanese unicorn tech company?**
Hi, I’m considering trying to get a new grad position at a Japanese unicorn as a SWE/data analyst/ml (mainly Mercari but others too). I’d like to keep my options open in case I don’t get into a decent tech company in my home country. If i receive an offer for tech consulting or non-dev work in my own country for example, would I be better off gaining dev experience in Japan if I were to receive an offer? (assuming it’s a decent company)
I understand that the chances are even lower to get a big tech position as a fresh grad in Japan than my own country.
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it really depends on the company I would say. junior engineer at Mercari/Line vs. tech consultant at Big 4 (assuming you are actually writing code at work every day) probably ends up getting treated the same by your home country employer. but I would 100% take a tech job somewhere like Woven over a non-tech job back at home. I have a friend who works there and have also looked into applying before, they actually use a modern tech stack and everything (from my perspective working in the Tokyo office of a multi national).
If by big tech you mean FAANG style companies. They are completely frozen on SWE hiring since like January. (Friends at a couple and I work at one) If you have a couple years of experience its much easier to get hired at a JP startup / Medium sized tech company. Straight out of college, it will be hard to find one, or at least one that pays well.
Non-dev vs dev, always go for the dev as long as the pay isn’t crazy out of balance.
I’d recommend finding a job for at least a year or two back home first. Moving to Japan + your first full time swe job sounds like double stress. If you really want to push yourself though go for it. As far as learning, in any place you work, new or old tech stack it probably doenst make too crazy of a difference. Focus on building the skills that transfer to anywhere you work. Learn every part of what you work on. Work on triaging with your team, being proactive about fixing issues you find.