Looking for an IT job in Japan with possibly a student visa

8 comments

1. This is a copy of your post for archive/search purposes.

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   **Looking for an IT job in Japan with possibly a student visa**

   Dear redditors of Japan sub,

   I would like to ask for some information regarding the possibility for getting an IT job in Japan. I’m looking for job possibilities for positions like front-end, mobile development in Japan. I have quite a good resume with 5-6 years of engineering. I just started to send applications last Thursday but the response rate from Japanese companies seems to be very good. But today a recruitment agency in Japan reached out to me and said that they cannot help me unless I live in Japan. They said I should try to find a way to relocate to Japan first then I can re-register myself and they might be able to help.

   So my question is if I come to Japan with a student visa to attend Japanese language school, what is the possibility for me to get a job offer from a JP company ?

   I am aware that what I am asking should be too sensitive to anyone currently living in Japan and looking for a job, but I need to ask to have a broad perspective regarding looking for a safe path to relocate to Japan. I am living in Finland, but I come from Asia, a sinospheric country, so JP culture and mine are quite similar and I have no fear for learning JP language. It’s just that it never dawned on me I would come one day to consider moving to Japan.

   Thank you in advance !

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2. [deleted]

3. > So my question is if I come to Japan with a student visa to attend Japanese language school, what is the possibility for me to get a job offer from a JP company ?

   I hire technicians in the IT industry, and there are two reasons I would not like to hire somebody not already in Japan:

   1) There seems to be this universal timeline that applies to everyone moving here where they go absolutely insane about 6 months after arriving here. It’s when all the “new and exciting” is wearing off, but the “comfortable living here” hasn’t arrived yet. People can act really unpredictably during that time, and if it’s an employee I’m worried that I’m gonna have to deal with the consequences (moving back to the home country without warning, leaving open rental contracts and all work responsibilities hanging, or getting arrested in a bar fight, or something like that).

   2) Getting the first visa can be a pain in the ass.

   #1 can be easily “fixed” by someone living in Japan on a student visa, but #2 can’t, because switching from a student visa to a working visa requires pretty much the same paperwork as applying for a working visa from scratch.

   So, in my case, anyway, it’d be easier to convince me to hire you if you were already here, but not as easy as if you also had the right visa category.

4. Well, that’s what I did. It took longer than I expected to find a good job though. I would only recommend it if you wanted to go to Japan on an extended holiday anyway and don’t have high expectations/a great need to find a job within the first 6 months to a year.

5. > But today a recruitment agency in Japan reached out to me and said that they cannot help me unless I live in Japan.

   This almost always mean that they want you to reside in Japan and hold a residence status that allows you to work in Japan (e.g. not a student visa).

6. If your goal is to live in japan, and work in IT. There’s still a way by applying to english speaking company like those big tech.

   Going via language school route is arguably one of the best option since you can give a taste if you like living in Japan or not, also self sufficient since It’s also possible to work part time while at it.

   The only downside is that you have to pay for school.

   I personally went with that route, 4 months in language school then apply for fulltime jobs while at it.
   I do have N3 ~ N2 ish level of conversation, but company uses English anyway so it doesn’t matter.

7. Interesting how the shortage of skilled worker in the IT isnt existent in Japan yet. In my country we are pretty desperate for mid level senior engineers. We try to get these guys from everywhere. They only need to speak English

8. Like other posters said, going to language school for a while isn’t a bad plan at all. It will let you experience living in Japan and improve your language skills.

   But, with 5-6 years of experience (and a college degree), it may not be your only option. You may not be an ideal candidate for a recruitment agency, but you said yourself that you were getting positive responses from Japanese companies.

   If you go to Japan with no Japanese, it probably makes sense to focus on companies that have an English language working environment.