Data Report on beBiters Part 1
Hello everyone! This is Eri from the MCO.
This is the first installment of “Data Report on beBiters,” a three-part series in which we will report on the results of the survey that was recently sent out.
This installment will be about questions related to work!
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■Biological Clock
To unravel everyone’s daily lives, we started out by asking them about what time they sleep and wake up.
According to the results, the most common wake-up time for beBit employees is between 6 am~7 am! The most common bedtime was from 12 am to 1 am, while 31% of employees go to bed after 1 am! In total, roughly 60% of our team goes to sleep after midnight. Everyone is up surprisingly late!
In Japan as a whole, the average time people wake up is 6:32 am, and the average bedtime is 11:12 pm. When comparing beBit employees, most people wake up around the average time while their bedtime is a bit later. I’m very curious to know what everyone does with their time after work until they sleep!
Through the answers above, you might be able to tell whether beBit members consider themselves morning people or night people.
As I thought, the night people make up roughly half the answers! According to one theory, night people are more flexible in the use of their time because they aren’t tied to the idea of going to bed early. In addition, it is said that they are more active in evening social activities, allowing them to interact with a variety of people which leads to more work opportunities. If you answered that you are a night person, does this theory apply to you?
■Meals
The following questions are about meals - the source of our energy! To start off is a question about the most important meal of the day - breakfast!
The majority preferred a western breakfast! In addition, surprisingly, roughly a 3rd of the staff do not even have breakfast. Personally, I used to eat Japanese-style breakfasts back in college, but nowadays I find myself eating a western breakfast that is easy to prepare. Looking at Japan as a whole, roughly 80% “eat breakfast on a daily basis.” It looks like beBit employees tend to skip breakfast a bit more than average!
Now, let’s take a look at lunch.
When looking at their lunches when they come to the office, roughly half the people eat out while 25% bring food they purchased back to the office.
There are many restaurants around the Otemachi area, which makes it quite difficult to decide what to eat. For those of you struggling to decide, we have collected everyone’s recommendations!
You can click the map below to find out more details through the link embedded!
■Homes
Next up, we have questions about their living situations. In recent years, more and more time is spent at home due to Covid. Being curious about where everyone spends the majority of their time at, we decided to ask everyone about what kind of home they live in!
Looking at the results, roughly 20% live in a standalone house while roughly 80% live in apartments and condos.
When looking at Tokyo as a whole, roughly 40% live in standalone houses while 60% live in apartments and condos meaning more beBit employees tend to live in condos and apartments a bit more than the average. Out of those who live in condos and apartments, most live in the bottom 4 floors while only 3% live on the 10th floor and above. For me, I choose to live around the 4th floor because even if the elevator stops, it wouldn’t be too big of a struggle to use the stairs.
We then asked everyone about the train line they use to commute to work and was surprised to receive 19 different answers!
beBit’s office is located in Otemachi, which conveniently has several train lines. Because of this, we received a variety of answers, but were still surprised by the number of lines running through Tokyo! (I tried making a graph showing the lines, but ended up with something that looked like a work of art.)
Now that we know what lines everyone uses, let’s see how long it takes for everyone to get to work.
Over 90% of the respondents take less than an hour to get to work, and roughly 40% live within 30 minutes of the office. The average commute time in Japan is around 1 hour 19 minutes (roughly 40 minutes one way), meaning we’re pretty close to the average.
Lastly, we asked everyone about their favorite points in their homes. We received many answers such as spaciousness, how well lit it is, and the environment around the homes, but I decided to pick out a few that I found interesting or nice.
・How white everything is (I totally get it!)
・How I can expect capital gains (Sounds like a very beBit answer!)
・The first floor is a parking lot and I live on the second floor, so I can be lenient with my kids when they are running around inside (It’s so important to be able to have a relaxed mentality!)
・Both my tap water and the water in the free faucets behind my house are famously delicious! (Amazing!)
・The antique shelf that my aunt gave me! (Lovely! So this is how history is passed down!)
・As I was planning on living here with my former partner, the room is quite spacious and comfortable (oh…)
For those in the midst of searching for a home or about to do so, I hope the information above can provide you with ideas to find a home you can enjoy living in every day!
■About work
Currently, each department goes to the office roughly once or twice a week while mainly working remotely. While most people work at desks and sofas at the office, let’s see where they work when they’re at home!
An overwhelming majority of people work at desks, followed by low tables, then by dining tables. Working from your balcony seems like a great way to re-focus, so I’m quite jealous!
The following are gadgets and tools that the respondents recommend for remote work!
・A monitor
・Ear phones 【Open-ear / Anker Liberty Air 2 Pro】
・A nice camera and mic / Bluetooth speaker
・A smartphone stand
・A height adjustable desk
・App to make your smartphone a webcam
・An external keyboard
The majority of people recommended a monitor for work. The laptops provided by the company are roughly 13 inches, so it would certainly be easier to operate with a monitor! Hopefully this helps in creating a comfortable remote work environment.
Now, let’s see what everyone does when they really need to focus. I personally listen to music, but looking at the responses, many people change their environment by listening to music, turning off anything that makes sound, drinking coffee, eating ramune candy, or exercising. We also received a few answers that focused on mentality as well:
・Choose a short span (10 minutes / 3 minutes) to focus
・Declare to my manager that I will complete the assignment by a specific date.
The idea of focusing for 10 minutes is something that can be utilized for house chores as well, so I may just give it a try.
Lastly, let’s go over some funny mistakes that were made when everyone first started working. Everyone goes through being young, and some mistakes tend to be made when you’re younger. Hopefully these mistakes can be looked back and laughed at!
●Common mistakes
・Called someone by the wrong name
・Forgot my business cards
・Took the wrong train/path
・Quoted a price including tax when it wasn’t supposed to be
・Sent a congratulatory message to someone who wasn’t promoted
●Painful Mistakes
・Spent a great amount of time preparing for a client meeting the night before and ended up sleeping through the meeting
・Got drunk and went to Takegawa-san's home, exchanged a few words, and fell asleep
・Had my boss come in on Sunday to review my output, while I went snowboarding
・Booked business trip tickets to Matsuyama airport in Japan instead of Songshan airport in Taiwan (both are written 松山 in Japanese)
・Without thinking, I said “Wow, we’re the same Year of the Dog! You’re 12 years older than me!” to a woman at work, who from then on looked at me with cold and judgemental eyes.
・After a meeting, received an angry email from the client criticizing my professional speaking skills
Everyone is very… experienced. After graduating, there was a lot to learn when first joining a company. While it may have felt as though you were just tackling the tasks that were in front of you, I’d like to believe that all of us are a bit more comfortable now.
That’s all for Part 1 of the Data Report on beBiters! Please look forward to our future installments as well!