"Kento Shimasu": What Japanese Business Actually Means
Reading the temperature behind the same four words.
Your interpreter renders it as "we'll consider it." Your notes say the same. The translation is technically correct.
It is also five different answers wearing one English sentence.
This is one of the most expensive translation problems in Japanese business. Not because anyone is being evasive, but because English collapses a spectrum into a single phrase — and the spectrum is where the meaning lives.
Kento shimasu - Four words, five different answers
In English, "we'll consider it" is one phrase. In Japanese, it is a range. Every variation translates back into the same English sentence, which means the distinction disappears the moment it crosses into your language.
The cost of that flattening runs in two directions, and both are expensive. Read a polite close as progress, and you spend months chasing something that ended in the meeting room. Read a genuine internal review as a brush-off, and you walk away from a deal that was quietly moving without you.
One caution before the list: do not confuse warm wording with procedural movement. The two are not the same thing, and conflating them is how most foreign professionals misread the situation.
The cool end: when "consider" means distance
"Kento shimasu" (We will consider it) Often a polite close. Occasionally a genuine internal review. On its own, this phrase is closer to neutral-cool than to encouragement — it neither commits nor refuses, and it frequently marks the end of the conversation rather than the beginning of a process.
"Kento wa shimasu ga…" (We will consider it, but…) The wa and the ga are doing the work here. The particle wa sets up a contrast, and ga announces the reversal that follows. An objection is already forming, even if it is never spoken aloud. In practice, this is a soft no.
The warm end: when "consider" means movement
"Mochikaette kento shimasu" (We'll take it back and consider it) Something has shifted. The proposal is leaving the room and entering the organisation. This is real movement — but slow movement, and it now depends on people you have never met.
"Shanai de kento sasete itadakimasu" (We'll consider it internally) Internal consultation may be starting. This is your cue to prepare materials that others can circulate on your behalf, because the conversation is about to happen in rooms you will not be in.
The hot end: when "consider" means real intent
"Maemuki ni kento shimasu" (We'll consider it positively) The warmest of the five. Maemuki — forward-facing — is a deliberate signal of intent, and it is not offered casually.
It is also still not a commitment. Warm wording indicates disposition, not decision. Treat it as the best position you can be in before a process concludes, rather than as the conclusion itself.
Why a direct "no" may not come in the room
It is tempting to read all of this as evasion. It is not. There is a structural reason a flat refusal rarely arrives across the table.
The person in front of you may not be the sole decision owner. In an organisation where accountability is distributed, a single individual refusing on the spot is not exercising authority — they are pre-empting a process that has not run yet. A direct refusal can also close doors before the organisation has aligned internally, removing options that might otherwise have stayed open.
Seen this way, "kento shimasu" has a clear function. It moves the question out of the meeting room and into the internal decision process, which is where the answer is actually produced.
It is not evasion. It is the correct procedural move.
What to do instead
Once you understand the phrase as a procedural handoff rather than a verdict, your next move changes.
Don't ask for a verdict. Never follow up with "so is that a yes?" It forces a public answer that no one in the room has the standing to give, and it puts your counterpart in the position of either misrepresenting the process or refusing you outright. Neither outcome helps you.
Make the decision easier to carry. Your counterpart's job is now to move your proposal through people who have never met you. Send materials built for internal circulation — risk, continuity, and precedent, not just ROI. The document that wins in Japan is often the one your champion can forward without having to explain or defend it.
Watch what moves, not what is said. This is the reliable signal. New stakeholders appearing on the thread, questions that get more specific, requests for internal documentation — these tell you more about where you stand than any phrasing does. Positive language is easy to produce. Procedural movement is not.
The takeaway
"Kento shimasu" is not one phrase with one meaning. It is a range, and the range is readable once you stop translating and start listening for temperature.
The goal is not to force a faster answer. It is to recognise where the conversation actually stands — and to make the next step easier for the person who has to carry it.
Want to go deeper?
Reading a single phrase is one thing. Reading a whole organisation — how it builds consensus, distributes risk, and decides who can say yes — is another.
That is what the Japan Strategic Readiness Programme is built for: an executive programme for professionals and teams in Europe working with Japanese partners, clients, and head offices.
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