Management at all levels cannot handle non-Japanese staff - Anonymous employee Rakuten Employee Review

1.0
Jun 3, 2015
Anonymous employee
Recommend
CEO approval
Business Outlook

Pros

- free lunch - moving to swanky new building soon

Cons

All levels of management have zero ability to effectively manage non-Japanese staff. Everyone expects everything to be done the Japanese way and other ways of thinking are shot down immediately. Power harassment and sexual harassment are rampant and HR and internal audit committees do nothing about it. Working hours on the business side are insane. Staying in the office until the last train home (around midnight) or on weekends is normal practice in many departments and teams. People who choose to work more efficiently and go home at a decent hour are bullied and given more tasks until they are back to working overtime again. Your performance rating will also suffer. Managers are known to order staff to adjust reported working hours to get overtime under 80 hours a month (80+ hours draws the attention of HR). Speaking of HR, it's a total joke. The only HR members who are remotely competent seem to be the non-Japanese staff and none of them are management AFAIK. HR also has a habit of announcing lots of activities to help foreigners improve the working environment but nothing is ever followed up on. So they obviously know about staff morale problems but are unwilling to do anything about it. Advancement opportunities are scant and extremely slow. It's kind of understood by most staff that promotions into management can only happen to those people with native-level Japanese skills. Salary and benefits are a joke compared to comparative companies. The only way to get a significant raise is to threaten to quit. The TL;DR: ineffective management, power and sexual harassment is common, insane hours, ineffective HR, no advancement opportunities, low salary and zero benefits other than free lunch.

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5.0
Mar 25, 2026
Recommend
CEO approval
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Pros

Rakuten Rewards has great life balance. Too bad the economy was getting rocked.

Cons

Don't really have any cons. I understand that the market's been hard so had to downsize the force, so that was kinda challenging. Hopefully AI will increase everyone's output.

3.0
Jan 28, 2026
Recommend
CEO approval
Business Outlook

Pros

The company offers great benefits and perks, and the overall work culture can be fun and social. When I first joined, it felt like a positive place to work and a good environment to learn. It’s a solid company to start your career, especially if you’re early on and want exposure to the role.

Cons

While the experience started off strong, there was very little room for growth long term. Opportunities were not distributed equally across the team, and favoritism was noticeable at times. The same individuals were consistently praised for simply doing their jobs, while others’ contributions were rarely acknowledged. The team culture could feel very cliquey, and if you weren’t part of the “favorites,” it was difficult to be recognized or considered for new opportunities. Although leadership often spoke about internal growth and mobility, in reality those opportunities felt extremely limited. Once you’re placed on a team, it’s very hard to move into something new or grow beyond that role. This is a good place to start your career and gain experience, but not a place I would recommend staying long term. If you’re looking for growth, development, and mobility within the company, you may find yourself feeling stuck.

3
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