This comes before a formal interview. Send it back, and we'll set up a call. We like to think that the "fit check" is as much for you as for us to see if you enjoy the work!
Everything below is "real" work in the sense that they're the kind of things we deal with most weeks (but the problems themselves are anonymized). What we mostly want to know is whether you enjoy it. If you finish and think these are the kinds of problems I like solving, that tells us a lot. If you finish it feeling irritated, that says something too, and we think you'd rather know now than three months in!
Expect about 90 minutes. But there's no timer, and longer isn't necessarily better!
Section 1 (Translation) gives you Japanese and asks for English, plus your reasoning. Where you made a deliberate choice about structure, rhythm, register or emphasis, say so. If it has a name, use it; if not, just describe it. The thinking matters more than the terminology.
Section 2 (Peer review) gives you Japanese and an English draft from a working professional. Not error-spotting — most of what's there is defensible and some of it is good. You decide first whether the draft needs anything at all. Often it doesn't.
Section 3 (Situations) describes things that have actually happened here. Nothing to translate — we want to know what you'd do, and in one case the exact words you'd send, in Japanese.
Section 4 asks where you think this work is going and what you want from it. Candid is better than complimentary. We're trying to work out whether this is the right place for you, and it might not be.
On AI tools: use them if you want. We build the newest tools into our own work — not to produce more words, but to clear the mechanical part so there's room to think about the content. Tell us what you used and how. If you reach the next stage we'll talk your process through with you, so the reasoning needs to be yours.
One thing about saving your answers. Your answers live in this browser, on whatever device you're currently using. So, if you switch from your phone to a laptop, or open this form in a private window, you might lose your answers. If you plan on changing devices, feel free to work elsewhere and paste in later if that's easier.
The Japanese here was written for this exercise. Any English drawn from real work has had client details removed.
Last but not least, we understand your time is valuable, so we promise to send you a 図書カード as a token of our appreciation once the process is completed, whatever the outcome!
