When you start learning Japanese, you learned the phrase; よろしくお願いします as a part of introduction. Which means “nice to meet you”. However, once you come to Japan or start working with Japanese team, you will realize that よろしくお願ねがいします is often used in different contexts and then you may start wondering whether the meaning is really “nice to meet you”? The answer is unfortunately No. There are a lot of other usages and also used in short form as 「よろしく！」in casual or conversing with persons at the same level or juniors.よろしくcame from 「よろしい」which means 「Good, All right, May/Can」
Usages of it can be divided into three sections.
- General よろしく
General よろしくis widely used and might be confusing. It can be used in the following situations.
- When You Meet People for the First Time /At the End of Self-introductions
- When You Start Doing Something with Someone
- When You Make a Request and Express Your Appreciation
- When you start doing any activity
- As a Customary Greetings in New Year
- Noun + よろしく
It is used when you are simply requesting something in polite language and literally translated as “please …”, “please take care of …” or “please treat … well”. It is often used as a closing phrase of the request.
For example. 協力をよろしくお願いします。
来週の授業、よろしくお願いします。
娘をよろしくお願いします。
- よろしく + Verb
It is mostly used to convey your regards to someone. For Example. よろしく言っておいて。Or よろしくお伝えください。