Japan struggling to fight shortage of skilled engineers

[kmguru]

Japan struggling to fight shortage of skilled engineers

TOKYO —
At the Chiba shipyard of Mitsui Engineering & Shipbuilding Co. facing Tokyo Bay, there is an office building with a sign reading ‘‘Center for Handing Down Technology,’’ and on its door, there is a poster with the faces of 28 older workers wearing helmets. They are veteran engineers, called ‘‘skill masters,’’ who are in charge of fostering young engineers. About 300 engineers at the shipyard, accounting for 49 percent of the total, are aged between 51 and 60. During the shipbuilding recession in the mid-1970s through the 1980s, shipbuilding companies refrained from recruiting new engineers with a resultant shortage of mid-level engineers responsible for the next generation.

http://www.japantoday.com/category/...ggling-to-fight-shortage-of-skilled-engineers

I bet they are not going to hire thousands with H1 Visas from overseas....

 

[Michael]

I wanted to take a lecturing job in Japan but they don't give tenure for non Japanese in most decent Uni's and they stick the gaijin with extra work load and in short I was told don't bother.

 

[Stryder]

Japan struggling to fight shortage of skilled engineers

TOKYO —
At the Chiba shipyard of Mitsui Engineering & Shipbuilding Co. facing Tokyo Bay, there is an office building with a sign reading ‘‘Center for Handing Down Technology,’’ and on its door, there is a poster with the faces of 28 older workers wearing helmets. They are veteran engineers, called ‘‘skill masters,’’ who are in charge of fostering young engineers. About 300 engineers at the shipyard, accounting for 49 percent of the total, are aged between 51 and 60. During the shipbuilding recession in the mid-1970s through the 1980s, shipbuilding companies refrained from recruiting new engineers with a resultant shortage of mid-level engineers responsible for the next generation.

http://www.japantoday.com/category/...ggling-to-fight-shortage-of-skilled-engineers

I bet they are not going to hire thousands with H1 Visas from overseas....

To be honest, the main reason they are missing engineers in that particular industry is how their management treats people still in that industry. Due to their age they are still in the mindset of "overproductive" to the point of Karoshi (Death from overwork), they are also pretty insular about having foreign nationals working with them. Usually because they tend to be brought up in countries that aren't use to the work ethics or commitments to quality, so are usually seen as useless.

I only know this from some old collegue's of mine having to go to Japan to fix a paint job on a leachate tank for a ship, They weren't actually responsible for the wrong paint being supplied or applied to the leachate tank originally. however they suggested it wasn't fun working with the Japanese in the shipyards, since the Japanese foremen was obviously use to bullying the Japanese around and didn't really get on with two guys from England which he saw as inferior.

So much so when they threatened to walk off the job, he actually managed to seize their passports and stated they wouldn't be returned until the job was complete.

 

[CheskiChips]

That being true, there's a lot of this same problem in ALL fields. They're currently in negative growth. They also refuse nearly all immigrents, which could potentially alleviate there problems. I respect their dedication to national pride though.