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How Japanese black companies oppress workers (2014)

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178 points rawgabbit | 4 comments | 18 Nov 24 04:02 UTC | HN request time: 0.001s | source
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infotainment ◴[18 Nov 24 04:44 UTC] No.42169771[source]▶
> "I can't quit the job. If I say I'm going to quit, I'll be threatened that I will have to pay damages for quitting."

Interestingly, this is actually possible under Japanese law/legal precedent. If an employee, for example, decides to put in notice and then half-ass their job until their departure date, a company could actually sue the employee and win.

Other Japan-labor-law fun fact: if you are a contract worker, it is literally illegal for you to quit prior to your contract expiry date. Hope you like that job you signed onto!

Obligatory disclaimer: IANAL

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1. kochikame ◴[18 Nov 24 04:58 UTC] No.42169829[source]▶
To balance this comment, if you are a full time employee you are super well protected and cannot be fired for any reason other than gross negligence or actively breaking the law.

Managing out a poor performer in Japan is a grinding process that can easily take two years from start to finish

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2. 0cf8612b2e1e ◴[18 Nov 24 05:26 UTC] No.42169934[source]▶
At a US F500 company, HR can still make it onerous to get rid of an underperforming employee. Wants multiple documented poor reviews to avoid any potential for follow-up legal action (which seems incredibly unlikely, but HR wants to cover their butts).
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3. lumost ◴[18 Nov 24 06:00 UTC] No.42170090[source]▶
I suspect these processes are also there to prevent “rocking the boat”. There are a number of US F500 companies that are effectively static businesses with predictable market dynamics.

In a stable environment, in a large organization, it doesn’t really make sense to fire people in the hopes of getting someone better. You are more likely to get someone worse, or more expensive, or who has a long ramp up period. It’s possible that the manager trying to exit an employee is exercising subjective/uncalibrated performance guidelines- or is covering their own incompetence.

4. irusensei ◴[18 Nov 24 09:20 UTC] No.42170944[source]▶
That explains this: https://www.theregister.com/2024/10/16/bandai_namcos_layoff_...

> "Bandai Namco reportedly tries to bore staff into quitting, skirting Japan’s labor laws"

> Canceling some game projects and shuttering existing ones has helped, but facing the need for further adjustments, Bandai Namco has reportedly turned to the unspoken Japanese tradition of layoff-by-boredom by stuffing unwanted employees into oidashi beya, or "expulsion rooms."

> Do a quick online search for oidashi beya and you'll see plenty of websites explaining the practice, or otherwise discussing how difficult it is to fire people in Japan thanks to strong labor protections. It's not a new practice, either: For those that haven't been reading the Reg for the past 11 years, we even wrote about it way back in 2013 as a wave of the practice swept through Japan and hit tech workers at companies reportedly including Panasonic, Sony and other firms.