Hand-writing Japanese kanji has proven to be an important asset for young professionals, even in the digital age.

Smartphones, computers and other gadgets have attempted to make penmanship or, shuji, skills irrelevant, but recently the opposite has proven true in the Japanese job market. Some companies even still ask their prospective employees to hand-write their resumes, and young professionals have been investing in tools to improve their penmanship in order to make themselves stand out to employers, including old-school books like Penmanship Practice Book: Become Able to Write Beautifully by Hand in 30 Days and modern apps like Bimoji, which lets you practice both block-style and script-style writing.

This is all on a different level from shodo, of course. The diligent art of calligraphic script is another beast entirely!