Today's column is for the sales people amongst us. The average smaller Japanese services company has somewhere between 30% and 50% of its employees working in sales, either as sales people and account managers or as support staff - so we're talking about a good chunk of the workforce.

Tough times knock sentiment, but it could be worse, right?

Against a bleak backdrop of a failing auto industry, it appears that a silver lining can be found in a new system - car sharing.

Back in November, the government released statistics stating that Japan's unemployment fell a full 9% from 4% to just 3.7%. When I first saw this, I had just finished watching the latest TV news installment about how many more part-timers had just been fired by Japan's leading electronics and automobile makers. Talk about a contrast!