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Japanese: A Businessman's Primer
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This page contains useful, basic information for the business person - or casual traveller - geared to gaining a better understanding of "how the system works" . It is not a lesson in "how to speak Japanese" but rather an overview of important background information that may unravel some mystery or give a little more insight....
When you're finished, click on Basic Reference Books for Visitors to Japan for additional useful reference material.
Japanese Language and Alphabet
First, a little bit of history.....
Japanese is written with three different sets of characters, kanji, hiragana, and katakana.
Kanji 
are the set of roughly 2,000 Chinese characters borrowed over several centuries starting from around the time of the first Buddhist missionaries from Korea and China in the 3rd - 4th centuries. (The word "kan-ji" literally means "characters (ji) of the Han (kan) people. At that time, Japanese existed in spoken form only. The borrowed characters allowed Japanese to be written. However, there are fundamental differences not just in monosyllabic Chinese and polysyllabic Japanese words, but in grammar (Chinese is somewhat similar to English, while only Korean and Japanese are grammatically similar to each other.) This was not a problem when using kanji for simple nouns or adjectives, but Chinese characters proved awkward to use for inflected words such as verbs. A system of phonetic characters (kana) were derived from various kanji which were then used to represent the various verb ending (conjugations.)
Kanji have both sound and meaning, and in fact, have several different pronunciations, depending on the context. This represents the biggest hurdle in learning Japanese for non-Oriental peoples.
Kana come in two forms: hiragana 
and katakana 
. Both represent the 56 sounds which combine to form Japanese words. These characters have a sound no meaning; they are, in this respect, like Roman letters. Although there are some "simple kanji" of a few strokes, in general, kana are written with just 2 or 3 short flowing strokes, while kanji are contain anywhere from 1 to more than 30! Most tourists usually can recognize the difference after a short time between the "simple characters" (kana) and the "complicated ones" (kanji.)
In general, hiragana is used to form Japanese words by themselves and in combination with kanji.. katakana characters are generally used for foreign loan words and emphasis; they are in this respect roughly (very roughly) comparable to italics.
When Japanese is rendered in Roman letters it is called romaji ("ji" means "character.") There are two main systems of Romanization, and though these systems are very similar, there are some differences which when used in place names, can be confusing to foreigners. The romanizations used here are suitable for business purposes, even if they do not correspond precisely to any standard romanization system or represent a thorough guide to pronunciation Keep in mind that different people may transliterate differently; for example, Ota, Oota, and Ohta are just different ways of spelling the same name (Ohta is the most common.)
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Important Points on Personal Names .....
In dealing with foreigners, Japanese will write their given name followed by their family name. It is important to remember that this is not how Japanese use their names. Saying "Jiro Tanaka" is as strange to their ears as "Johnson Jimmy" would be in English.
Also, unlike in English, where it is acceptable to say "I am MR. Johnson," thereby clearly indicating that "Johnson" is the family name, in Japanese, one never uses san with ones own. When introducing themselves in English, Japanese will almost never say "I am MR. Tanaka;" Rather, just "I am Tanaka." Since most foreigners are familiar with only a few Japanese family names, this is a source of much confusion, as it is easily to misinterpret the lack of the use of "Mr." as implying that the names used is their "given name."
Westerners would also be advised to use the terms "family name" and "given name" when talking about Japanese (and Asian) names, as the use of the common terms" first name" and "last name" will only add to the confusion, since this is not the common order in Asia.
Japanese rarely use another Japanese person's given name - it is reserved for intimate friends and family members. Business people always refer to their colleagues by their family name, usually (but not always) with the honorific "san." Foreigners should follow this example. However, within the company, Japanese usually use a person's business title in place of "san," (e.g. Tanaka-bucho, (Director Tanaka) instead of "Tanaka-san."
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Corporate Titles
Here are some typical titles, in descending order of seniority:
| Japanese |
American Equivalent |
Other Common Translations |
| kaicho |
Chairman |
|
| shacho |
Chief Executive Officer |
President or Managing Director |
| fukushacho |
Chief Operating Officer |
Vice President |
| senmu |
Executive Vice President |
|
| jomu |
Vice President |
(sometimes Managing Director) |
| torishimariyaku (supplementary title) |
Officer |
Director |
| bucho |
Director |
General Manager |
| kacho |
Department Manager |
|
| kakaricho |
Section Head |
|
| shunin |
Supervisor (shop-floor) |
|
It is best to establish a person's Japanese-language title because of the vagaries and uncertainties of translations. There is usually only one fukushacho in a company, and he functions as a deputy to the shacho. A jomu is a vice president in the usual American sense of a "V.P., Finance" or "V.P., Marketing." A jomu torishimariyaku or a senmu torishimariyaku is a jomu or a senmu who is also a member of the Board of Directors; the titles usually go together. Because of the different organization of Japanese and American companies, it is more accurate to think of a torishimariyaku as an executive with an officer's authority to commit the corporation rather than as a Board member.
In Japanese, the title san can mean many things. For example, the approximate equivalent of "Mr. Tanaka" is Tanaka-san, the form to use when you do not know the person's title. But "Tanaka-san" can also mean "Ms. Tanaka." or "Mrs. Tanaka" if the woman is married. It is more respectful, however, to address people in correspondence with sama, an even more respectful form of san.
TIP: Commonly, a woman's given name often ends in -ko, -e, or -mi (no hyphen (e.g., Masako, Kazumi) but like most rules, there are many exceptions.
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Company Names
Virtually all Japanese companies doing international business are corporations, which in Japanese designated by at least the word Kaisha (which just means "company") and most often by Kabushiki Kaisha, (which means "incorporated", literally, "stock" (kabu) "style" or "type" (shiki) "company" (kaisha). NOTE: Kaisha is often pronounced gaisha when it is preceded by another word, such as kabushiki.
This kabushiki gaisha is usually abbreviated K.K. (The traditional British Co. Ltd. is also widely used as a translation of "K.K." ) Alternatively, the word "Corp.," "Inc.," or even "S.A." may appear.
Frequently, parts of the company's name such as "Tanaka Trading Co. Ltd." will be the same company as Tanaka Boeki K.K. Be aware that a name like Tokyo Electric Co. Ltd. is a complete translation and not the legal name of the company.
Most corporations using the abbreviation "K.K." are publicly traded (but not all.)
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MORE THAN YOU THOUGHT YOU WANTED TO KNOW ABOUT......
ADDRESSES
CONCEPTS
It is important to understand that the Japanese system of addresses is organized around quadrants, not streets. Though some large thoroughfares do have names, such as "Ginza-dori" and "Hibiya-dori" and the Japanese people do refer to these streets in a general way, no addresses are based on them. There is no "123 Ginza-dori" and "1-2-3 Ginza" does not refer to No. 123 on Ginza Street. The hierarchical system of street numbers in most Western cities where by "even numbers on are one side and odds on the other" does not exist. This is why you cannot just give an address to a taxi driver and expect him to find it!
This is a source of much frustration for foreigners, who often take taxis and are surprised that handing the driver the complete address will be met with puzzled looks and an inability to find it! One of the most frequently heard complaints about travelling by taxi in Japan (there are few, as Japanese drivers are almost universally scrupulously honest and courteous) is, "I gave him the address - in Japanese no less! - and he still couldn't find it."
This section is designed to give some background which will explain why this is a common occurrence - even for the Japanese! If you don't speak Japanese and can't explain how to get there, it's always best to have a map of where you are going to show the taxi driver. Most businesses have maps which can be faxed or emailed specifically for this purpose.
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STREET NAMES
There aren't any.
Well, that's not 100% true, but it's better to say that, to get the point across. Only a few really big streets have names, but this is only for local reference. The most common street name emanating from the central station in many towns is "Oo-dori" which literally means "big street" or "main street." Street names do not exist in addresses. The Japanese addressing system is based on a quadrant system, roughly meaning "blocks" of a neighborhood, not on streets with linear, numeric addresses. In other words, there is no "123 Ginza Dori" designating a specific building on Ginza Dori with the number 123, which would be "up" from 120 and "down" from 129 Ginza Dori.
However, you can find neighborhoods named after a major streets. In these cases, however, it doesn't alter the structure of the addresses - they are still based on the chome-ban-chi system. Foreigners, however, may run across these famous streets and assume it is a street number system and be confused.
Usually, a neighborhood name will probably end in either -cho or -machi. The kanji, however, is the same. The character has two pronunciations (but which one to use is fixed.
In the countryside, the numbering system changes, since there aren't the "quadrant" blocks of the cities. Often an address will end with "mura", which means village. There will frequently be another location name used, usually designating the village section. There will be just one number attached, such as
345 Nakamachi, Naka-cho
There are other variations, but for the casual visitor, with little understanding of Japanese, a treatise on the variations and implications of Japanese addresses would serve to confuse rather than illuminate.
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KUs, SHIs, GUNs & CITY NAMES
There are 12 major Japanese cities officially designated by the government. These 12 cities are:
| Fukuoka |
Kobe |
Sapporo |
| Hiroshima |
Kyoto |
Sendai |
| Kawasaki |
Nagoya |
Tokyo |
| Kitakyushu |
Osaka |
Yokohama |
These cities are divided in "ku," or "wards'. Only these 12 cities have them. Other cities may have the suffix "shi" but are not divided up into wards.
Now, further complicating matters is the suffix -shi, which means "city." Frequently, when addresses are rendered into romaji (Roman letters), "shi" is translated into "City." However, it is never used with Osaka, Kyoto, or Tokyo.
In a rural areas, the suffix -gun is used. This literally means "country" and coincidentally has the same nuance as "in the country" in American English.
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COUNTRY / PREFECTURE / CITY NAMES
First, a little more history.....
The English name "Japan" has a a mysterious past, but most agree that it has its roots in an old Chinese name for Japan, ""jipanguo" roughly meaning "silver country." In those ancient times, silver was highly prized in China, which lacked this resource in any great amount. They traded for it with Japan, which had it in relatively large quantities. Thus the name.) The first Europeans ( usually attributed to Marco Polo - ) to visit China heard tales of a distant land called "ji-pan-guo" and marked it on their primitive maps. As is the case with many linguistic corruptions from antiquity, ji-pan-guo became shortened to "Japan."
The Japanese refer to their country as "nihon" or "nippon", which come from the two Chinese characters for "sun" (ni) and "root/base" ("hon" or "pon"). This is where the term "land of the rising sun" originates. The Chinese characters mean something akin to "the base of the sun/ place where the sun is," in other words, "where the sun comes from." Thus, in English, "rising sun." The difference in pronunciation is rooted in Japanese grammatical rules for combining Chinese characters. Generally, the softer "nihon" is used in daily conversation when just referring to Japan in some way, and "nippon: has a little stronger and a bit more governmental/historical/emphatic overtone. However, it is a bit like the differences in nuance among "America", "the States," "the U.S.", "the U.S.A.", and the "United States of America." There are differences, but it's difficult to precisely establish exact "rules" for their usage.
Japan has 47 administrative districts, called "ken*, which are translated as "prefectures" in English, and roughly correspond to "states" in the United States (but with far less independence in laws.) They are:
| Aichi |
Hiroshima |
Kumamoto |
Okayama |
Tokyo* |
| Akita |
Hokkaido* |
Kyoto* |
Okinawa |
Tottori |
| Aomori |
Hyogo |
Mie |
Osaka* |
Toyama |
| Chiba |
Ibaraki |
Miyagi |
Saga |
Wakayama |
| Ehime |
Ishikawa |
Miyazaki |
Saitama |
Yamagata |
| Fukui |
Iwate |
Nagano |
Shiga |
Yamaguchi |
| Fukuoka |
Kagawa |
Nagasaki |
Shimane |
Yamanashi |
| Fukushima |
Kagoshima |
Nara |
Shizuoka |
|
| Gifu |
Kanagawa |
Niigata |
Tochigi |
|
| Gunma |
Kochi |
Ohita |
Tokushima |
|
* The exceptions are Tokyo-to, Osaka-fu, Kyoto-fu, and Hokkaido (the northernmost island province) which are not actually "ken" but are classified with them as independent administrative districts. In the case of Tokyo, -to is the character meaning "capital" and in Osaka and Kyoto, the character"fu" generally means "government," it just designates that the cities are self-governing areas with the generally the same administrative powers as a -ken.
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OFFICES & FLOORS
Floor numbers in buildings are usually written as "4th Fl.", or more commonly just "4F," before or after the building name. Room numbers are also sometimes used.
In cases where there is no building name, or it is not commonly used or known, room/office numbers are usually added as an extra (usually 4th) number after the building number; thus, 1-3-4-222 Shinjuku would refer to can be assumed to designate Room or Office number 222, which would probably be on the second floor.
NOTE: Japan follows the US-style floor numbering convention, i.e., the street-level floor is not "Ground (as in Europe) but rather "1st Floor."
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BUILDING NAMES
Almost all major office buildings have names. The word for "building" in Japanese is "birudingu," originally coming from English. As it is quite a long set of sounds for Japanese, in modern use it has become just "biru." (pronounced "be-ru" (NOTE: This is not to be confused with another foreign loan word, "beer" which is pronounced "beee-roo", with a lengthened "e" sound.)
A building is almost always written in postal addresses, however, it is on a separate line such as:
Mori Building 3F
2-3-4 Akasaka
It is never included as part of the numeric address such as (incorrectly) :
2-3-4 Akasaka Mori Building 3F
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BUILDING NUMBERS
A building address is usually composed of a series of two or three numbers, for example, " 2-4-5 Shinjuku." However, there is no standard rule or consistent method of rendering it in Roman letters. Thus, you may see is represented as:
2-4-5 Shinjuku
or,
Shinjuku 2-4-5
4-5 shinjuku 2-chome
or
4-5 2-chome Shinjuku
Shinjuku is the name of a particular neighborhood; that is, an area comparable to Soho in London, the Centrum in Amsterdam, the French Quarter in New Orleans. It will usually contain about 6-7 subdivisions, called a "chome" (pronounced "cho-may".) It is rare to have more than about 8 chome.
In the northernmost island of Hokkaido, they use a more modern grid system, as does, interestingly enough, the ancient city of Kyoto, borrowing it from the ancient first capital of China, Xi'an.
A chome is often translated as "block" in English, but is really Number 4 in the example represents what is usually called a "block" in English, really refers to a large grouping of buildings which often, but not always, corresponds to a "large city block" simply because of the easy divisions by streets. In the country, however, this may not be the case.
The second number ("4" in the above example) refers to what is called "ban-chi", often translated at "lot" or "lot number" but may contain several buildings or houses, depending on the original size of the lot!
The third number, 5 in the example, is that of the individual house or building. The suffix -go means "number." in Japanese.
Thus, Shinjuku 2-4-5 is Shinjuku 2-chome, 4-banchi, 5-go
In practice, 2-chome does usually adjoin 3-chome, and 4-banchi usually adjoins 5-ban-chi, although after that, the actual building number may be more chronological than hierarchical. Still, the Japanese numbering system is much more orderly than many foreigners think - but it still is important to have a map or landmark to guide you to your destination!
For P.O. Boxes, the English phrase "PO Box" is generally used, usually without punctuation, as in the example. However, PO Boxes are not common. you can usually tell by the suffix "-91" in the Postal Code" which is the designation for PO Boxes.
