Exchanging Business Cards In Japan

Above, Tokyo office and apartment buildings. Photo by Armand Vaquer.

Back in 2001, I made my first trip to Japan. Having read much about Japanese customs previously, I was already familiar with how the exchange of business cards takes place. There's a lot of formality involved and it would be best that anyone who goes to Japan on business or pleasure (or a little of both) familiarize himself/herself on the customary of exchanging business cards.

Fortunately, GaijinPot has posted an article on just this topic. You may want to bookmark it for future reference.

They begin it with:

One of the perennial topics in Japanese business etiquette is the exchange of business cards, or meishi koukan (名刺交換) in Japanese. 

It’s a subject that has been addressed many times in all sorts of media, and yet the fundamental rules and social etiquette surrounding the practice are still frequently mistaken. 

Today I’ll go over the process of exchanging business cards and present a few choice phrases that should put you in good stead.

To read more, go here.