The first thing I want to say is that I really love my job. I negotiate for my company in all areas, basically I am a company negotiator. When it comes to sealing deals, setting things up and making arrangements I’m the man who manages the projects.
I will go into more detail than that because I don’t want to bore you I don’t want get specific about who I work for. But mostly it is domestic work, with the odd foreign contract or negotiation to deal with.
But I have got a bit of an odd one now because they want me to sort out a deal with a Japanese company based in Tokyo. Now although the basic English is fine, I speak absolutely no Japanese and so I’m looking for an option for how I can communicate thoroughly so that I can get this right.
The idea I have come up with is to use an online Japanese translation service. Something like translateshark.com, or similar, basically a website where you upload the text in English or Japanese, and a Japanese translator, or an English translator will translated expertly into the opposite language.
What I’m thinking is that if I make sure that emails are translated, so I create it in English, send it to the Japanese translation service who will then translated into Japanese, then I email it. Then when the reply comes back I get that translated Japanese and English and I can then understand exactly what’s going on.
Although having to use a Japanese translator for every piece of communication in or out will maybe slow things down by about a week over the course of negotiations, it does mean at the end of it all that things should be a lot more tight than they would be otherwise. I’m paranoid about confusion and I like to be in control, and actually bit of a control freak and I think that this will help me to feeling control otherwise I will be wondering what is falling between the cracks.
Anyway, that’s basically what I do. I’m not going to bore you with any more details on it now, just update this blog as I talk about myself. I also want to attack some other issues I have, apart from the loneliness, I also suffer a bit from stress at times. I think I maybe the unhealthy and at something else I think I need to address. I think setting goals and backing them up in this blog might be a way forward.
pastouryears 