Daniel Orenes Ferrández, Senior Manager of Customer Experience at Uber, discusses the concept of Omotenashi, the Japanese philosophy of anticipating customers’ needs and sincerely apologising before resolving a problem. Daniel has lived and worked in Japan for over a decade, including five years leading conversational AI initiatives at Rakuten before moving into his current role at Uber, where he focuses on the delivery partner experience across Japan.
Daniel explains why apologies matter so much in Japanese customer service. Japanese language has between ten and fifteen ways of saying sorry, ranging from formal to casual, and choosing the right level matters as much as solving the issue itself. He walks through how generative AI prompts can now select an apology tone based on the contact type and the severity of the issue, something that was impossible with the fixed responses of older NLU systems.
The conversation also covers Aimai, the Japanese concept of ambiguity used to maintain harmony in conversation. Japanese speakers rarely say no directly, often using softer phrasing instead, and AI systems need specific prompts to capture these signals during sentiment analysis. We discuss how this affects escalation strategy and why personal connection with a human agent remains highly valued in Japan.
Daniel describes how digital personification through mascots plays a major role in Japanese customer service, and how integrating with Line, the country’s dominant messaging platform, is essential for any conversational AI deployment there.
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