Japanese · Specialist course
Japanese keigo business lessons for the register that causes real offence
Keigo is where otherwise fluent speakers cause offence without knowing it. It is a system, it is learnable, and it is almost never taught properly.
- CEFR B1
Who this is for
Is this the right course for you?
Professionals working in Japanese companies, candidates preparing for Japanese job interviews, and learners around N3 or above who need to operate credibly at work.
What you cover
What the lessons cover
- Sonkeigo and kenjougo: honorific and humble forms as one system
- Client email conventions: openings, closings and the phrases that carry weight
- Telephone manner, which is harder in Japanese than almost anywhere
- Meeting language, including how disagreement is actually expressed
- Apology formulas and when each level is appropriate
- Self-introduction and the interview register
Business Japanese is taught here as a register course, and keigo is the substance of it. The grammar is not difficult; the system is unfamiliar, and the consequences of getting it wrong are social rather than grammatical.
One system, not two lists
Sonkeigo raises the other person, kenjougo lowers yourself, and both point at the same social fact. Taught as two vocabulary lists it is bewildering; taught as one system with a direction, it becomes navigable.
Nobody will correct you
The practical problem with keigo is that Japanese colleagues are unlikely to tell you when you have got it wrong. Errors therefore persist indefinitely, which is the strongest argument for learning it deliberately rather than by absorption.
Business Japanese & Keigo questions, answered properly
What level do I need before learning keigo?
Around N3. Keigo restructures verbs you already use, so it needs a stable base to attach to — layering honorific forms onto shaky grammar produces sentences that are elaborate and wrong, which is worse than plain and correct. Below N3 we will suggest general lessons first.
Is keigo really that important?
In a Japanese workplace, yes. It signals awareness of relationship and hierarchy, and getting it wrong reads as either rude or oddly familiar rather than as a language mistake. Colleagues will rarely correct you, which means errors persist for years. That is precisely why it is worth teaching deliberately.
Can we practise for a Japanese job interview?
Yes, and it is one of the more useful things this course does. Japanese interviews have strong conventions — the self-introduction, the reason for applying, how you discuss your own achievements without either overstating or dismissing them. Sessions are run as rehearsals with follow-up questions rather than scripted practice.
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