I work mainly on Technology projects between the U.S. and Japan and being knee deep in it day to day feel the ups and downs in the field more than most people.
I recently read an article by Martin Fackler of The New York Times concerning the crisis that Japan is facing in technology and engineering. Due to the dwindling number of students entering these fields of study over the past two decades, there is a serious shortage of qualified talent to fill needed positions in these fields in Japanese companies and foreign companies operating in Japan. As an American who speaks Japanese and works in technology, I understand the difficulty and see if almost daily as I go about running my business.
I went to a presentation at the Japan Society in New York about a year and a half ago by the president of Microsoft Japan. In his presentation, I was very excited to hear him speak of the many initiatives that Microsoft was involved in with various Japanese technology partners. What was even more exciting to me was his mentioning the possibility of many, many more. The problem was that even though these opportunities were present, there was a lack of qualified resources to be found in Japan to take them on. A backlog of IT projects due to a lack of developers, software engineers, etc.
He also mentioned the difficulties that smaller companies are facing in Japan in terms of utilizing technology to advance business operations. They don’t have the money to attract the qualified talent that they need, and if they did, there is a very limited number of people to go around. Small companies that need technology the most to play bigger, have the lowest percent of IT usage even in the most basic form such as e-mail.
To emphasize this point, I received my first e-mail from a very close friend in Kyoto who has been running her family’s small business for the past 8 years. Our usual written communication until mid-February of this year had been by fax because that was all she had available. Imagine how small businesses like my friend’s could expand if they could utilize technology to the same levels as small businesses do in the United States?
I wonder if there are government programs that assist small Japanese businesses comparable to the Small Business Administration and its many diverse programs (that I have benefited greatly from) in the U.S.
I am sure the Japanese government has programs but to what degree are they out there assisting Japanese entrepreneurs, especially women entrepreneurs?
If you know, please write in and share your thoughts on this. Large and small companies alike face the same issues these days in this area. What can be done is the million dollar question?
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