Interview with Divij Singh of Rakuten Symphony, Japan

This is the 15th interview in the “Interviews with Foreign Information Technology Engineers in Japan” series. “ EJable.com’s Ryoko Nagai talks to Divij Singh of Rakuten Symphony, Japan.

Video Interview with Divij

Transcript of Divij’s Interview

Ryoko: Hi, Divij. Thank you for joining us today with us at EJable. I’m happy to have this time to hear your story, from studying in Japan to working at Rakuten Symphony. So, it would be great if you could begin by giving us your introduction.

Divij: Yeah, sure. And it’s nice to meet you too. A quick introduction of mine would be that I did my high school and undergraduate degrees in India.

I earned a Bachelor of Science in Computer Science, and from there, I came to Japan and stayed in Fukushima while I did my master’s degree at the University of Aizu. So my master’s degree was also in computer science.

It was during COVID, so it was not a lot of fun. It was kind of isolated. Afterward, I joined Rakuten Symphony, and now I’m working with them as a data science engineer on the AI platform team.

Ryoko: OK, great. Thank you for the introduction. What was your first encounter with Japan, or what made you want to do your masters in Japan?

Divij: I would say they’re two different things here. My first encounter with Japan, you know, hearing about it in the news or seeing video games coming from there or anime or those kinds of stuff.

Ryoko: Right.

Divij: In terms of actually coming here to study, during my undergraduate university studies, I had a professor who knew another professor who taught in Japan.

When we were looking at graduation, I was applying for jobs, and the professor in India said why don’t you look at studying in Japan? There’s this university called the University of Aizu, which offers courses in English. It’s a good place where you could do your master’s.

And as it happened, COVID had started around that time. So, places were slowly going into lockdown, and I figured that, OK, it’s going to be challenging to get a job at this point. So why don’t I look at doing my master’s degree? And it worked out like that.

Ryoko: OK, so how was your experience? Well, especially, it’s a bit different, when it was COVID.  how was it studying in Fukuoka? Sorry, Fukushima, I mean, doing your masters there.

Divij: Yes, Fukushima.

Ryoko: Was there a lot of international students?

Divij: There were international students, but unfortunately it was difficult to actually meet them. Because due to COVID, we didn’t have any social events.

I mean, I personally find it a little difficult to socialize with people after class. Plus, if there’s some kind of event or something, then it helps me get to know others more easily. Yeah, so as a result, most of the people I knew were those who were in my department or in my lab, which was the database lab.

Ryoko: OK.

Divij: So I did get to meet a few international students there, but there was a much wider student body, which I didn’t get to interact too much with at that time.

Ryoko: OK, I see. And how was your experience? Well, maybe it’s a bit specific when it was, you know, the beginning of COVID, but what about your experience moving to Japan? Had that process been a bit difficult, or was it smooth?

Divij: So, I was fortunate because my university handled a lot of things.

I mean, obviously, they had to get my certificate of eligibility, but I had to get the Hanko or the stamp. So, they helped me with that. They gave me a few different apartments I could look at for my stay and helped me negotiate with things like setting up electricity, gas, water, and all of that.

Ryoko: Right.

Divij: Overall, it was relatively smooth. I mean, because of COVID, I had to quarantine for two weeks in a hotel near Tokyo, but afterward, they helped organize my transport as well, the train, which I had to take. When I arrived, they had a few staff members there, specifically to help international students.

Divij: They helped me set up my apartment and get my basic documents and everything. Set up “My Number card” for tax purposes. They were a massive help to me.

Ryoko: OK, great. So, I guess with the help of your university, even if you don’t speak much Japanese, it was not a problem.

OK. From the Japanese language perspective, did you find it different when you started looking for apartments after university, after your master’s?

Divij: So, after my master’s degree, I had to move to Tokyo. Yeah, and it wasn’t too difficult either because I was able to find a real estate agent who spoke English. She was a very friendly lady. She helped me find an apartment and set up my utilities and even my Internet. She was very kind. I have had friends who have had to do some of it on their own.

Ryoko: Oh, amazing. OK.

Divij: It I mean it definitely depends. I got very lucky because, yeah, I found someone really nice.

Ryoko: OK, so in general, do you speak any Japanese, or do you feel like you need to learn or have a little bit of Japanese when you are there?

Divij: Absolutely. I mean, especially in Fukushima. So, if you come to Tokyo and go to a convenience store, odds are the cashier may know a little bit of English to be able to help you out, but in Fukushima, no, nothing.

Ryoko: Yeah, of course. OK.

Divij: They, you know, they just speak Japanese. They have no reason to learn English. So, I picked up some basic Japanese. So, if I need to get something done, or go to a store to get something, or have some general questions, I can do that much.

Ryoko: OK.

Divij: I do feel that I need to improve because I know that it’s holding me back, I mean, my current level of Japanese. So, that’s something I’m trying to push myself to improve on.

Ryoko: OK, I see. Then moving on to your current work position, could you explain a little bit about what Rakuten Symphony does? I know that it’s a good company of Rakuten, of course, and I know that it has to do with mobile technology. Could you tell us more?

Divij: So, you have Rakuten Mobile, and they are trying to compete as a mobile carrier in Japan. Right? And, in order to compete, they’ve got a different network architecture and different sort of approach to the mobile network to try and stand out from the competition.

Ryoko: OK.

Divij: And what I think they realized is that we have this technology… I mean, their network is more cloud-based. The idea is that you have a small base station that relays the information back to the servers. Whatever processing has to happen happens there, and it sends the information back. So, you don’t need much of a setup in each location.

And I think, I mean, this is me guessing what the thought process was, but they probably said that we have this technology, we’re creating the hardware, creating the software we needed to be competitive in Japan. But what about overseas? We are creating all these tools, all this hardware. Why don’t we look at how we can sell it overseas to other telecom operators? And so Rakuten Symphony was sort of split off from Rakuten Mobile with the idea that Rakuten Symphony handles the software. And I think some of the hardware side of the operations.

And also sells those services to overseas companies.

Ryoko: OK, I see. So, is your working environment comprised of many international workers?

Divij: Absolutely. I mean. I would say that Rochan Symphony is easily 50% or more international workers.

Ryoko: Oh, wow.

Divij: Of course, we have our Japanese coworkers, but the company has also absorbed companies overseas. So, it’s quite a diverse group.

Ryoko: OK, I see. Good. Then what do you like about your current position?

Divij: The main thing that I like about my position is the level of learning that I’m able to receive here. One of the challenges of data science is that a lot of the time, companies want somebody who has experience working on large data sets, and that’s difficult for you to do on your own because you have a computer, but you won’t always have the data, or you won’t have the sort of difficulties which actually companies face.

Handling large amounts of data and creating machine learning systems to handle them here allows me to gain that experience, and I’m able to work with a larger number of experienced team members who can also give me a certain level of guidance and help me.

Ryoko: Right.

Divij: Otherwise, I would be struggling a lot more to build my skills to where they are right now. If I were with, say, a startup, the level of challenges and the level of techniques required would not be even close to the same.

Ryoko: I see. OK, cool. Yeah. Then do you feel like as a, Well, not necessarily a new graduate, but just after your Master’s degree and going into Rakuten, was there kind of help and support from your teammates?

Divij: So, from my teammates, not so much. But that’s because my teammates are actually in India 😊 and I’m over here in Japan. But my colleagues or others whom I joined with, we keep in touch, and we help each other out if somebody needs something. Most of us had already been living in Japan for a few years, so we had the experience to handle things.

But in teaching me skills and tools for the job, then absolutely my team has been a huge help.

Ryoko: OK, great.

Divij: My manager gives proper, pointed feedback on specific things to work on if I have done an analysis on some data incorrectly. Then, a teammate of mine will walk me through the correct steps, what they’re looking for from the analysis, and what I need to think about, which is very important to build that foundation.

Ryoko: Yeah, of course. OK, then, do you think that there is a difference in working styles between when you were doing your internships or working in India and now working in Japan?

Divij: It’s a little difficult to say because I am working with an international team, so yeah, the Japanese work culture is not as strong over here, but I do feel that there is pressure to get things done by the deadline to get things done, to have things very well fleshed out, very thorough. Look, I don’t know if that’s due to the company or due to the country. I don’t think I know enough to say that, but I did do one internship in Japan, which was again with an international startup, so it was a little more relaxed. I was able to fully remote work. My current company expects me to come to the office every day.

Ryoko: Oh wow.

Divij: And they’re a bit stricter on rules. For example, my team is in India; therefore, there’s no real benefit for me to come to the office. Yeah, because anyway, I will go home, and I’ll still do some remote work with the deal, but because the rule is that you have to come to the office, I’m expected to come to the office. So, there is that strictness about the rules.

Ryoko: I see. OK. I haven’t heard that from many of the people that I’ve had an interview. So, it’s interesting to see the differences. Yeah. OK. And then, did you feel that had to change how you work or how you work with your teammates in order to fit into the company that you you’re working with?

Divij: Not too much if I compare it to my internships. Oh, so I mean I wouldn’t compare my college work because of the flexible deadlines and you know you work whenever you want. That’s not even close to how organized you have to be in a company.

However, with my internships, it’s fairly similar. I have to keep in touch with my manager or with the senior team members and just share the progress of my work as I continue. They may ask me at the end of the day what I accomplished today or what I worked on today. So, I have to be able to give that. I have to be able to sort of break down my work into smaller goals and show that progress as I complete those goals.

Ryoko: Ah, right. Interesting. OK, then, moving a bit into getting the job. I mean, how did you get the job? Do you feel like there was anything that you specifically had to do when you were applying for jobs or while you were doing the interview? Was there anything that you focused on improving on? I mean, any tips?

Divij: I understand. So, I was looking at a data science or software engineering role, and the one thing that most companies I applied to had in common was some form of practical test.

Ryoko: OK.

Divij: Now, this could be they give me a data science or a machine learning kind of question, and they asked me to create a basic recommendation. Or they’ll give me access to some data, and they’d say, give us some insights about this, this, and this from the data. Or they’ll just give an online coding test so you have competitive coding where it says this is your input, these are your constraints, give us your output. And then you have to write a program that handles that. Or even they might just ask me questions.

Ryoko: Like on the spot?

Divij: Yes, on the spot. So, if I’m doing an interview with someone, they may say, OK, we have a swimming pool, and we need this information about the water pump; these are the factors that affect the water pump. How would you create a model, a machine learning model, or a data science model to give us the information we need? So, you don’t necessarily have to do it, but you have to know the concepts which you would apply.

Ryoko: Right. OK. And I assume that all of these interviews were done in English.

Divij: Yes, I did try one Japanese interview. It was very difficult 😊. But yes, otherwise, all of those interviews were done in English.

Ryoko: OK. This may be a bit of a specific question, but do you feel having done your master’s in Japan gave you a bit of a head start or, you know, a plus to who you are and when you were applying for jobs?

Divij: Definitely, being in Japan definitely gave me a bit of. A boost when I was applying to companies because a lot of the time, the companies want somebody who is already located in Japan.

As I understand it, the process of getting someone from abroad requires some more investment from the company. So, if you’re already located in Japan and, better, you’ve graduated from a Japanese university, the company will have more confidence in you. And they say, OK, he’s graduated from a university over here; he meets a certain standard. If it’s an overseas university, they may not have as much confidence because they don’t know what the standards of that country are and how much you might have learned.

Ryoko: That’s true.

Divij: Whereas if you’re coming from here, it gives them a bit more confidence.

Ryoko: Yeah, OK. I see. Then, looking into the long term, do you have any goals for your career here in Japan or just in data science?

Divij: Of my main two goals, the first one is to improve my understanding of more widely used systems.

Here, an unfortunate downside of working with a larger company is that a lot of the software development process is segmented.

So, what I mean by that is that if a team comes to us and says we want you to create code that does this, my team will do the prototyping. We’ll do the research and we’ll create the basic model. Yeah, but then we’ll give it to another team, which will then look at integrating it with the current system and determining how to deploy it. Yeah, these are. It’s more specialized skills.

However, since I’m still early in my career, I feel like it would be more beneficial if I had a better idea of the entire process. That is, this is where you start; this is what you do. And, now that you have your solution, you use it in this way to deploy it so that the customer can use it.

Ryoko: OK, I see.

Divij: And that’s something you miss out on.

Ryoko: OK.

Divij: That’s one understanding of the entire process and the different tools used in it, which I wish to improve.

The second thing is I absolutely want to improve my Japanese because I keep an eye on the job market just to get an idea of where I currently am in my career and how well I’m doing. And I see that there are so many roles, which are good roles, but they want a certain level of Japanese, typically JLPT N3 or N2 level Japanese, and it’s very obvious to me that, you know, I’m just hurting my chances by not improving my understanding of the language.

Ryoko: OK. I see. I know that some companies offer foreign workers to take like Japanese lessons. Is that something that your company also offers?

Divij: I believe it does offer a discount for some lessons.

Ryoko: Oh, OK. Is it something that you have in mind to take up?

Divij: Oh no. I plan to follow a slightly different path. OK, I’m trying to improve by reading. You have these sorts of graded reading books. They start with the basic characters, the hiragana, and Katakana, and then slowly introduce Kanji.

Ryoko: Ah, OK, interesting.

Well, moving on to your social aspects here. Being in Japan, what do you like about the Japanese culture?

Divij: So, one thing I like about it is the “order.” It’s not to say that, you know, everybody always walks in a line and there are no crowds or things like that. No, people move around. People are people, but there is a certain level of order you can expect from interacting in public. There is a certain structure to how things are done, which is efficient, and once you get the hang of it, it helps you.

So, something very simple, you have an escalator. If you are going to stand still on the escalator, you stand on the left. And if you want to walk up or down then you go on the right.  And unless it’s really crowded, in which case both lines get filled. But. It’s simple, and it’s efficient. It helps people get where they want to go faster instead of just standing wherever they feel like on the escalator, and if you’re in a rush and want to go up quickly, you have to push people to the side or ask them to move constantly.

Ryoko: Right. OK, I see what you mean.

Divij: It’s just, I think, that sort of social consideration, which is expected from each person and it helps.

Ryoko: OK. Was it difficult to adjust to that in the beginning, or was it something that you needed to learn?

Divij: I mean, I wouldn’t say it was difficult to adjust. I did have to learn to get an idea of what people do and see why they do it. But a lot of it is very logical and simple to follow.

And there are aspects which I’m not a fan of, you know, I mean, if you’re taking a phone call with someone in Japanese, you’re expected that even while you’re on the phone, you bow because of the idea that the other person can feel the seriousness or the respect. I think this is a bit much, but you know, I think with any culture, you have the good and the bad aspects, and you have to look at what works out for you and what you’re comfortable with.

Ryoko: I agree. OK, then, how do you like to spend your free time?

Divij: If it’s after work, I’ll probably just sit at home and play some video games or paint or something.

On the weekends, I try to meet up with some friends. Either we’ll go and have lunch somewhere, or we’ll try to do some activity or something. One of the benefits of living in a city like Tokyo is that there are a lot of things going on, and if you have interests like, say, video games, you have the Tokyo Game Show. If you like anime or manga, you have Comic Con,  you have Jump Festa.

You have all of these massive conventions that take place, and you can go and check them out and interact with people. There’s a lot more opportunity to do things here.

Ryoko: OK.

I know that this is a bit different, but a lot of tourists think that they struggle with finding activities because of language. Do you think that’s the case?

Divij: You mean activities in English?

Ryoko: Yeah.

Divij: Yeah, I would agree.

Ryoko: Oh, OK.

Divij: So, if you don’t know Japanese. 90% or more of your interactions will be with expats or maybe Japanese people who have lived abroad and come back.

I mean, there is an effort to try to be more inclusive of English speakers, but at the same time, I don’t think that people feel any need to go out of their way to try to include people who speak English or attract more English speakers.

You know, a lot of the English support comes from the fact that being able to speak in English or being able to serve people and talk to them in English benefits business from foreigners, and not by any real desire to get to know everyone else. I’m talking from a customer service point of view,

Ryoko: OK. OK, I see what you mean. OK. Yeah. Then maybe the last question from me. Do you have any tips or advice for those who are abroad and are looking for work in Japan?

Divij: As I said before, graduating from a Japanese university or even language school is a big plus that greatly improves your chances. Knowing or learning Japanese also massively increases the chances of success.

Ryoko: Oh, really? OK.

Divij: And make sure to write the JLPT test so that you have a proper certification of your Japanese level.

Ryoko: Right.

Divij: And finally, look at startups or look at more international companies because they are usually open to supporting people with relocation or coming to Japan, especially larger companies because they often have a full setup. So if you’re coming to Japan for work, you need a company to sponsor your initial work visa, and larger companies are usually more willing to do that as they have a better setup to support.

Ryoko: OK. Yeah, that’s true. Of course, they’re more used to doing it as well. Yeah. Great. Well, that’s it from my side. Do you have anything else you would like to share?

Divij: Just one thing: it can get a bit lonely here because, like I said, until your Japanese is better, a lot of your interactions will mostly be with foreigners. Even once you learn Japanese, you still have to learn their social customs and the way they interact with each other, which is very different.

Yeah. And if you come here, don’t come with the expectation that you will be seen as someone who is Japanese or something of that sort. They have a sort of distinct identity. It’s not necessarily negative or positive.

You will you. You’ll be a foreigner, but that comes with its own benefits. The benefit is that you won’t always be expected to follow all of their customs.

If you’re worried about how people in public will react to you, they won’t react as strongly because they know, oh, you’re a foreigner. Yeah, but you know, don’t try to make your identity the identity of the country. Keep your own identity, but also be respectful of where you are and the people there.

Ryoko: OK, great.

Divij: Because I think that’s a trap that a lot of people fall into, and then they feel very depressed about it, thinking, why don’t they see me as one of them?

Ryoko: Yeah, for sure. Yes, great. Well, thank you for those wise words, and thank you for your time as well. And I wish you the best of luck in the future.

Divij: Thank you. And I wish the best of luck to anyone who watches this.

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