Graduating in 2000 from St.Petersburg State University with the degree in Management and Economics I came to Japan for an internship at an IT venture company. Half a year later I signed a full time contract with the same company and have been working there ever since. Through the years I tried myself at everything within the company - from software engineering to 3D modeling and video content creation. Presently, I lead a corporate branding team.

Why I Came to Japan

You know how some foreigners come here because they like manga, food, or Japanese culture in general. Japanese culture is awesome no doubt, but I came for none of those things. My goal was independence and work in IT. Even though I didn’t have a technical education, I was fascinated with all things Internet and wanted to learn as much as possible. When I joined an international student organization AIESEC that offered me a technical internship in Japan, I jumped to the opportunity without thinking twice. For the first 6 months I learned how to code and was already working on mobile applications when the company offered me a full time job.

One of my first culture shocks was the fact that almost nobody could speak English. However, the second surprise was that it wasn’t really a problem as everyone at the company was always patient and willing to help.