August 2011
Sony Corporation: The Internal Communication Strategies of Multinational Japanese Companies
The Passion of the Creators Results in Good Quality Information
Sato: The flow of the recent project was as follows. We first met with the PSG and talked with everyone to gain an understanding of the current state of affairs and the PSG's wishes. We used this as the basis for making various proposals. Solidifying the concept by going so far as thinking together with the client about the ideal state of intranet websites was not only an extremely good experience but also quite interesting.
Ueda: When I saw what had been created, my impression was, "Yes, right. This is exactly it." For some reason, when you see something that was in line with the vague image that you held, you feel comfortable with it even though you hadn't had anything really concrete in mind.
Mitoma: It was extremely helpful that we were able to consult with Arc Communications from the beginning and talk about what we would do regarding the content rather than building a website by just redesigning it. It became clear to us what kind of information we should provide and what we needed to do to achieve that. There are no doubts in terms of its operation, and we have been able to keep our motivation up at a high level.
Shibata: As those working on site, it makes us very happy to hear that. I think that a contributing factor for the success we enjoyed in this project was that we were able to communicate closely with Mr. Ueda and Ms. Mitoma. I could feel everyone's motivation gradually rising as the project progressed, and I had a strong sense that people were really getting passionate about it.
Ueda: Attitude is very important, isn't it. I see this with the articles that Ms. Mitoma writes, too. When you want to create good content, the passion of the creator is reflected in the task. The message from the general manager, too, for example, might be written on a plane despite a very busy schedule. That passion comes through to the reader. The accumulation of short bursts of information, like on Twitter, has significance, too. However, I realized anew that when it comes to sharing an awareness, lengthy information that digs deep into a single theme is important.
Evolution into a Well-developed Informational Site--Global Information is of Great Interest!
Ohsato: Lastly, can you tell us the goal of the PSG intranet website?
Ueda: We would like to further advance the globalization of the PSG intranet website. A large variety of topics can be written about considering that we are involved in business on a global scale. However, my hypothesis is that we are guilty, in many cases, of not being able to sufficiently isolate these topics or share them. Therefore, what I would like to do at the PSG intranet website is to collect information, such as problems that customers are experiencing globally or good stories related from people on-site. Ultimately, I want it to become such that people feel that the content written in English on the global PSG intranet website is more interesting than the Japanese content, and so people in Japan read the global site without thinking twice about it--a sort of inversion phenomenon.
We look forward to your continued cooperation with us on such matters as to how we will go about creating an information-sharing scheme, what we will do in terms of site content and how it will be expressed, inclusive of translation.
Ohsato: I, too, look forward to our continued relationship. Thank you very much for your time today.
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