No experience, but drastic plans to move back home

1

Hey all! Completely new to the forum and I’m glad I found this. I’ll try to keep this short, but I was wondering what the landscape was out in Tokyo right now. I’m in the U.S now, but am planning on moving back to Japan within the next few years. No dev experience but am planning on learning, whether it’s a bootcamp or college or even self- taught out here.

My plan is to get the initial training and then get into any kind of junior role and go from there. Any languages/stacks that are more common out in Tokyo? I’m thinking about getting into Javascript first but I know many of you are Rubyists.

As for me, I grew up in Japan and wife is Japanese. My Japanese is at a native level, so I’m hoping my programming ability doesn’t have to be a slam dunk in a few years.

Any help would be extremely appreciated, I really want this career change but wife is also wanting to go home! I don’t want to jump the gun without getting a feel for the landscape there.

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Japanese companies traditionally hire university students with no experience (before they’ve graduated) or developers with professional experience. Being in between that, it is possible to get something, but it is outside the norm, so you may face some extra challenges.

Also, Japanese companies are pretty reluctant to hire people who aren’t already based in Japan. A lot of their hiring processes are based very much on in person interviewing, and many are not willing to make accommodations.

Rather than trying to find a junior developer position, your best bet might be to find something that utilizes your native Japanese and English ability + your experience thus far is someone relevant (if possible) + having a basic understanding of software development.