Rakuten

Free lunch and dinner if you stay past 7? But even that gets really repetitive, since they're so cheap they only pay for the cheapest tier of the catering service they use. (And then brag that it's the same catering as Google, but Google pays for a higher tier for its employees.)

Oh lord, don't get me started. Technically speaking, the management style and workflow are terrible. Teams within departments are segregated (Japanese vs. foreigner) and assigned responsibilities haphazardly. As a software engineer, you will absolutely want to tear your own hair out at least twice a week. By default, front-end engineers, back-end engineers, product managers, and designers (which, instead of handling UI & UX, are split into a UI team and a UX team, for god knows why) are physically separated from each other and not allowed many, if any, open channels of communication. After months of protesting, we were able to convince them to allow us to "test" a cross-functional team with our project, but we still aren't allowed complete contact with PDMs and designers.

This means that you will be blocked more than you will be working, and that you will find yourself redoing the work you've done at least twice due to a lack of communication. Due to this flawed structure, no one knows what the hell is going on within a project either—which is by design. Most roles are so divided and micromanaged, so as not to give too much responsibility to any given person, particularly developers, as it is a "security risk."

The management system rivals the DMV in terms of bureaucratic prowess and may be the most racist/sexist system of leadership I've seen since I binged-watched Mad Men. As a developer, the majority of the coworkers on your level will be foreigners, and they will be brilliant, open-minded, kind people. The majority of your manager's, and their manager's, and their manager's manager's, and their manager's manager's manager's (yes, it goes up this far and more... all in one department) will be Japanese, and are the all-powerful driving force behind this inefficient excuse of a bureaucratic nightmare. They will block you at every turn, feed you misleading information, pretend to understand your English, pretend you don't understand Japanese—pretty much anything you can think of that could impede progress on a project.

This is also where a lot of the racism and sexism comes in. Despite boasting a desire to become a "global company," managers will passively (and sometimes actively) harass foreign employees if they don't act in accordance with the company's work culture (which, to be fair, is ailing mostly to the same extent as general Japanese corporate work culture, but Rakuten is a global tech company and supposed to be different, right?).

Harassment that I've witnessed includes, but is not limited to:

• Rumor spreading
• Changing hours
• Not approving recorded work hours and forcing PTO usage
• Docking pay
• "Ganging up" on people in meetings
• Micromanaging
• Sexual harassment
• Religious discrimination
• Not respecting religious holidays (against company policy)
• Docked pay
• Docked bonuses
• Refusing department change requests
• Rejecting promotions after years of work
• Rejecting pay raises after years of work
• Bad-mouthing employees
• Physically hovering over people doing work
• Assigning out-of-scope work

And the list goes on.

On top of all this, the pay is subpar (starting at a rough equivalent of $35,000 a year before tax for a software engineer). The pay raises for foreigners can be non-existent. There is a stupid, pyramid-scheme-esque ranking system that is tied to available job roles and salary amount, that literally (though they try to deny this) is based on the amount of years you have been at the company.

The benefits are... ha, what benefits? You aren't even awarded sick days. If you do happen to come down with something that they won't allow you in the office with (like the flu), well, say goodbye to the few PTO days you have (11, by the way, you get 11 for the year) because they will make you use them. And no, you can't just do that work from home, even though you and your work laptop are fully capable of doing just that, it isn't allowed. Neither are flex hours, making up for late time by staying late (because you're just expected to stay late :)), or any of your typical software engineer amenities, honestly.

Also, they treat the CEO, Hiroshi, like some sort of god. It's really creepy. Like, I'm so serious, it reminds me of some cult from the '80s or something. And he honestly isn't that smart or impressive. CEOs like Zuckerberg and Gates, they're not only technically savvy but also know how to be creative and get a feel for how their entire company is operating. I don't think Hiroshi could write a line of code anymore, and he either has no idea what's happening within his company, or he's lying with a smile on his face every time he speaks about how "progressive" Rakuten is.

So, if this hasn't scared you off yet, you are a braver person than me, and I wish you all the luck in the world.

If you want to claim being "global" and want to innovate and compete on a global level, start acting like it. The Rakuten offices in Europe and America have great feedback from employees and seem like awesome places to work. So why can't the Tokyo office get it together?