Without year-end bonuses, why do Japanese people still look forward to company annual meetings?

This is an extremely limited occasion in the hierarchical Japanese society where you can temporarily let go of your class.

Financial World (ID: cjtxzk) Text | Mulan

Editor | Zhou Chunlin

Illustration | Chao Chunbin

In the blink of an eye, another Years passed. The Japanese only celebrate New Year's Day but not the Spring Festival, so the New Year atmosphere begins to brew at the end of November, and merchants are making every effort to promote it. So, what kind of advertisements are most common at the end of the year and the New Year? Not promotional discounts, nor tobacco and alcohol gifts, but medicines: gastrointestinal medicines, liver protection medicines, medicines to relieve headaches, oral liquids that can quickly refresh you? Because starting from the day when the calendar turns to December, Japanese company people will Drunk for a month!

Just like Chinese companies have a "reunion dinner" and "year-end party", Japan also has a "year-end party", and there is more than one. Various departments, colleagues with good relationships, important or not important customers, classmates and friends from the same hometown? All kinds of combinations of interpersonal relationships should have a good drink in December. Being drunk is a veritable "year-end party" - you must forget the good and bad of this year before you can welcome the new year.

It is said that in ancient Japan, the emperor and other nobles gathered together to write poems at the end of each year. They were so happy that they forgot everything, so they named it "Forgetting Years". When the people heard this, they were so happy, so we have to "forget the New Year" for a while! But what should people do if they don’t know how to write poetry? How can we be so happy together? Then have a drink. I drank until I was so drunk that I forgot everything. The custom of "Year-Ending Party" has been passed down in this way.

At the end of the year, all restaurants in Japan also launch various New Year’s party set meals. The important thing is not what dishes to eat, but the unlimited drinks included in the set meal. However, savvy businesses also unanimously divide the evening into two time periods, usually two to three hours each. Please leave after drinking. The next batch of guests are still waiting to be seated.

I just attended the EMBA Tokyo Alumni Association’s year-end party, and the organizer booked a craft beer bistro. The boss removed all the seats and forced everyone to sit around the table and drink. Plate after plate of food was placed on the side, and there was unlimited beer. The food that usually tastes good has completely lost its quality at this time, but everyone is just focusing on drinking and can't taste the quality at all. While increasing revenue and significantly reducing costs, I suspect that the entire year's profit of the Japanese catering industry comes from this month's New Year's Eve party.

The most amazing thing is that as soon as our time slot arrived, the store owner issued an unceremonious eviction order: we must leave within five minutes. In a departure from the politeness of the Japanese service industry, all the waiters stopped working and stood straight in a row urging us to leave. They kept emphasizing that we must all leave within five minutes! Because they have to spend ten minutes cleaning up and setting up the venue to welcome the next batch of guests. A group of us were in such a hurry that we were rushed to the roadside without even having time to put on our coats.

However, the vast majority of people have no objection to this, because many people also need to attend two New Year's Eve parties in one night. After all, the more New Year parties you have to prove your popularity, the better. Anyone who has to go home alone in December, or who doesn't look hungover when he goes to work the next day, is simply the most pathetic loser.

I am an exception who really dislikes attending New Year's Eve parties. The food was terrible, the crowds were crowded, and everyone drank like water until they were drunk. Walking home, I see traces of vomiting on the always tidy streets almost every day, which disgusts me. However, Japanese people absolutely love year-end parties, because this is an extremely limited occasion in the hierarchical Japanese society where they can temporarily let go of their rank. You can get drunk, point your boss in the nose and yell at you.

There is a petite and gentle female colleague in our company. Every time she gets drunk during the New Year party, she calls her boss "Bagya Lu", and she is extremely tough. At last year's New Year's Eve party, her boss held a glass of wine and toasted her, praising her for a job well done on a certain project. She slapped the table and interrupted the boss' words, angrily saying: "Shut up, mom! Don't talk about these useless things, just give me some extra credit." Salary!" I was sitting next to her, and I was petrified with shock when I saw this scene.

But I observed her in the year that followed. At work, she was still respectful to her boss and friendly with her colleagues. Her boss still rewarded her and criticized her accordingly. Everything that happened at the New Year's Eve party seemed not to exist at all.

The picture comes from the Internet

There is another thing that makes me dislike Japanese New Year parties, that is, there are no material benefits. Most of the time, we in China don’t eat well, but there are red envelopes and lucky draws! Most Japanese New Year parties don’t have these. A Chinese friend and I attended a particularly high-end New Year's Eve party this year. We almost invited a small chamber symphony orchestra to perform live, and the various arrangements were beautiful. Everyone was wearing evening clothes, drinking and drinking, talking and laughing. At the end of the day, a friend of the organizer proudly said that this annual meeting had a huge budget. After hearing that astonishing number, my Chinese friend and I pouted our lips and complained in Chinese: Humph, with such a huge budget, why don’t you arrange a lottery? Alas, it’s better to have a domestic annual party!

Are there any proud companies in Japan that reward their employees by traveling to other places and holding annual meetings at the same time? Of course there is. But there is a very strange ritual, which is to wear the company uniform, hold the company flag, and take a group photo in front of a landmark scenery or building to express your visit.

I recently saw a freshly released photo of a friend and his colleagues who specially put on company uniforms and took a group photo with Mount Fuji as the background after hosting a year-end party at a famous hot spring. In order to take a picture of the golden sunrise in the east covering the snow-covered peaks of Mount Fuji, I guess they set out early in the morning to get to this wonderful shooting spot, so half of the people in the photo looked completely sleepy, and the other half were hungover. The pain of having to get up early is great and the hatred is deep. It is said that this photo will be sent as important information to new and old customers in the next year. I guess the customers will never feel their enthusiasm and vitality from the photo.

My Japanese friends also asked me what China’s New Year celebrations would look like. They imitated the gesture of turning the table turntable and asked me if there were endless delicacies at the Chinese New Year party. I said, first of all, we don’t call it the Year-End Party, we call it the Annual Party. But the purpose and meaning are similar to those in Japan, that is, everyone has to work hard all year round, and everyone, whether rich or not, has to get together and have fun.

Of course, China’s five thousand years of food culture is extensive and profound, and we always eat well whenever we get together. So, how to highlight the special features of the annual meeting? This is the second difference: our annual meeting has many programs. Many famous female stars are often invited to the annual meeting. I also showed my colleagues a photo of Terry Gou dancing with Lin Chiling in his arms. The naughty colleague filled the entire phone screen with Mr. Guo’s face and exclaimed: Look at his face, how happy he is! Our boss said angrily: If I were allowed to dance with a female star in my arms, I would be so happy.

In order to stimulate my boss, I showed the photos of Alibaba’s annual meeting. From Snow White to Michael Jackson, even Jack Ma spares no effort in performing. Therefore, at China’s annual meetings, leaders must take the lead and enjoy themselves with the people. Speaking of this, my boss's face was no longer as happy as before. I went on to say that at the annual meeting in China, the most important thing is that the boss hands out red envelopes and draws prizes. At Tencent’s annual meeting this year, an employee won a grand prize of 400,000 yuan, which is 7 million yen! At this point, my boss couldn't stand listening anymore and directly started a round of cheers to change my topic.

However, the lack of material rewards really does not affect the happiness and enthusiasm of Japanese people in participating in year-end parties. In particular, year-end parties are basically reimbursed by the company. Anyway, Japanese companies have high taxes, so instead of paying taxes, it is better to give everyone food and drinks at the end of the year. Everyone drinks until the last subway train to go home and comes to the company with a hangover the next day, so don’t expect everyone to be able to work. Even my boss told me directly: "Don't talk to me about work. I drink every day this month and my brain can no longer work."

Days like this lasted until New Year's Day. In January, just like December, we still have gatherings and drinks every night, euphemistically called "New Year's Party." No wonder Japan’s fiscal year ends in April every year. Clean up your mood in February, work hard in March, and sort out the work and finances of the previous year in April.

As for December and January, it is left to the Japanese to bid farewell to the old and welcome the new in intoxication.

(The article in this column only represents the author's personal opinion, the original title: Say goodbye to the old and welcome the new in drunkenness)

This article was first published in the 149th issue of "Finance and Economics" published on January 8, 2018 "World" Weekly