That being said... I would steer anyone I like away from any non-sales position with this company. There is simply no respect in the corporate culture for any employee who does not have the word "sales" in their title. In fact, Keyence is notorious for extremely high turnover of personnel that go on to get management positions in other companies. So much so, that there is an almost decade gap between even junior management and any non-management employe, people simply do not see a reason to stay more than five years here as the rewards simply do not keep pace with responsibilities. Most comparable companies will pay double the base salary for the same level of work. Recently, Keyence has wised up to this fact and deliberately lowballs base compensation and titles far out of proportion to actual responsibilities. For example, it is not unusual for somebody with a specialist or senior specialist title to be doing work that would be assigned to a junior manager at any other company. In fact, the non sales career track has no viable development options and tops out well below any professional (Senior manager, director, VP, etc) level.