I’ve been warned on both fronts!

I have tickets for that for when K get to Tokyo. This was especially nice as we were pretty much the only people there!

I’m here as part of the Nagasaki Nomads programme. Working on my book, exploring the forces shaping the future of work, and living my own small experiment in place-independent working.

Follow along as I try to make sense of communication, work, and life, from Nagasaki to... wherever’s next.

It’s one of many paradoxes I’ve noticed here in Japan:
a country beginning to recognise these challenges, but where solutions are hard to find, and harder still to implement.

But with AI rewriting job descriptions and consumer behaviour shifting by the month, the half-life of a skill is now just a couple of years.

We’ll all need to learn, unlearn and reskill... constantly.

Yet many workplaces still treat learning as a compliance exercise, not a competitive advantage.

In a country once famed for its lifetime employees and extraordinary commitment to work, engagement is now among the lowest in the developed world.

Are those things connected? If you don’t believe learning new skills will get you noticed (let alone promoted) why would you bother?

Something the facilitator said stuck with me: despite Japan’s world-class education system, little learning happens after people leave it.

Once formal schooling ends, so does structured skill-building.

OECD says the same: Japan ranks among the lowest for participation in adult learning.

Likewise. I feel they’re not a great idea for people who over-index on the Sips.

This was the original photo 😂

I had a hundred better things to do so obvs I spent an hour making this

Imagine how much fun waiting for the bus would be if we had these in Zone 3.

Also wearing a designer scarf.

It’s been over a decade since I last went to Osaka so I’m not much use on that one. Tokyo… it’s so hard to pin down a list! At least one of the big temples (Senso-Ji, but it’s crazy busy). Go up a tall thing and marvel at the skyline. Karaoke. Tsujiki market.

Now right now that is a v niche use case. But it’s one that exists here, and may be needed in the future as those same forces impact Europe and the US.

So is this robot a bit shit and clunky? Yes. Is it still worth experimenting with stuff like this? Also, imho, yes.