Why My Company Survived 18 Years in Japan’s Unwritten Business System

Amica
Dec 10
4 min read

I didn’t grasp the full impact of this until I realized my company had survived 18 years not only because of strategy, funding, or corporate theory, but because of goen — the Japanese belief that people are connected by fate.

A friend recently told me, “You should share your business stories.”

So here I am, starting my writing life.

But before that, I should explain who I am and how my cross-cultural background shaped the way I navigate Japan’s quietly complex business system.

Growing Up Between Two Cultures

I’m Japanese, born to Japanese parents, but a significant part of my adolescence unfolded in the United States.

Japan’s junior high school lasts three years, and I spent the summers of the first two of those years in America. Then, in September 1992 (in the Japanese school system, the academic year starts in April and ends in March), just after entering high school, I was sent to the U.S. again, this time as a one-year exchange student. I ended up staying a total of eight years, until I completed my studies at university.

My host family moved from Missouri to Rhode Island, so I lived in both:

Lake Saint Louis, Missouri → Wentzville High School
North Kingstown, Rhode Island → North Kingstown High School

North Kingstown High had ESL classes and homerooms — something Wentzville didn’t. In my ESL class, there was a Puerto Rican boy and a Spanish girl whose English was weaker than mine. Even that small detail taught me how different environments shape opportunity and survival.

After one year at a public high school, I attended a boarding school in Massachusetts, where I spent my junior and senior years before moving to Boston.

Those years were full of experiences — some good, some bad — but looking back, I cherish most of the time I lived in America.

Seeing Japan’s Business Culture From the Outside

I often wonder if anyone is truly curious about Japanese business customs. But if you’ve worked here, you know they’re unlike anything else.

Japanese business can be:

sincere, gentle, relationship-oriented
and also… surprisingly naïve, indirect, and bound by tradition

There are concepts like nemawashi (behind-the-scenes consensus building) and tatemae (socially expected behavior).These invisible practices often matter more than official rules.

Even now, I sometimes think, “Why is it still like this?”

Still, the culture has shifted. Drinking parties once considered mandatory, unnecessary overtime, and suffocating seniority structures have relaxed — at least in the cities, I think. But in many places, fax machines still dominate, and older employees often earn more regardless of performance.

Japan is modern on the surface, traditional underneath. And if you want to survive here long-term, you need to understand both.

My Company, and the 18-Year Mystery of Survival

I’ve run my business since 2007 — a translation and interpreting company that grew slowly, quietly, and unexpectedly. Looking back, it feels miraculous that we never collapsed.

But the truth is simple: We survived because of the people around us.

My husband, who runs the company with me.

Our long-term clients.

People who worked for us and with us.

And especially the person who encouraged me to start writing here.

In Japanese, we say: “I can never raise my head to them again.” It describes someone to whom you owe lifelong gratitude.

That person is a kahu — a priest of ancient Hawaiian tradition — and a professional psychic. I first met him about thirteen years ago when I worked as his interpreter.

And I should say this as well: my host parents are also among the people to whom I will always feel deeply indebted. They took me in, guided me, and supported me in ways I could never fully repay. Much of who I am today exists because of their kindness.

And that brings me back to a word central to Japanese life.

The Power of Goen — Fate-Bound Connections

Japanese people place deep value on goen, the idea that all encounters happen for a reason.

There’s a Buddhist saying:

“Sode furiau mo tashō no en.”Even brushing sleeves with a stranger is the result of karma from a previous life.

It sounds poetic, but in business it’s surprisingly practical —because in Japan, relationships keep companies alive more than systems do. At least, that’s what I believe.

My company survived 18 years because clients didn’t just stay with us —they moved to new companies and brought us with them.

New job → introduce us
Next job → introduce us again
Another move → introduce us again

This chain has repeated for more than a decade, and the number of accounts just kept rising. It feels almost mystical.

And honestly, much of it comes from my husband’s natural charm. He’s a born-and-raised Edo-Tokyo man who isn’t confident in English, but in both Japan and the U.S., strangers constantly tell him: