New Project!
NAKAMA Creating New UNIVA Culture

Happy New Year 2023!
Looking forward to working with you again this year!

This year’s UNI-SQUARE will focus on NAKAMA and delve into the personalities of still unknown individuals. We are also planning to dig deeper into the secret stories and successes of new projects initiated by NAKAMA. In our January UNI-SQUARE we introduce a fresh-from-the oven hot new project just right for the start of a new year. It is a fact. For the first time ever, the UNIVA CAPITAL Group is shifting to an SNS platform shared by the whole group. UNIVA Paycast (UPC)’s Hiroyoshi Yamane is spearheading the creation of this service, which has been provisionally named “UNIVA SNS.” In this UNI-SQUARE Yamane describes for our NAKAMA the events that led to the launch of this project, current issues, and future directions. Because the success of this project depends on the cooperation of all of our NAKAMA, the interview ends with a request for your help. Everyone should participate.

Discovering Our Group’s Unknown Value and Appeal

Yamane’s exceptional resume includes rare experience as a specialty magazine journalist. After joining UPC in May 2020, he was actively involved in the Marketing Division. Then last year he moved to the newly created Research & Development Division and became primarily responsible for new service development and external PR.

One of Yamane’s tasks alerted him to the necessity of a Group SNS. A case occurred for which UPC’s internal resources were insufficient and he was searching for an external vendor. He was working hard on the search but couldn’t find the right company. Then, when he was at a loss, he discovered that a Group company was just the one he was looking for.

“Despite its being in the same Group, it took so much time and effort before I stumbled on it. We still work with that company, but we must be missing chances to do business with other Group companies and NAKAMA.”

When Yamane, inspired by that thought, surveyed UNIVA Group companies, he was surprised to discover many he knew nothing about. He felt that many offered attractive products and services of which he was unaware.

“The UNIVA CAPITAL Group has companies and employees all over the world. UNI-SIGHT shares internal information in three languages; but we still lack a place and a tool that makes it possible to communicate with individual colleagues. Despite our shared consciousness that we are NAKAMA, we need to create a space for active communication among our NAKAMA. That is what I thought.”

Take Advantage of the UNIVA Culture that Welcomes Challenges

Yamane

Yamane used UPC’s Innovation Challenge Pitch system* to propose the construction of a Group SNS to UPC CEO Shuhei Nakao. Then, in July 2022, Nakao took the proposal to Chairman and Group CEO Shuji Inaba, who approved its implementation.

“I was truly surprised that this project, for which members were recruited not only from UPC but also other Group companies, and which started from my personal initiative instead of a top-down order from the company, was chosen as a project for the Group as a whole. I experienced directly the reality of the UNIVA culture that welcomes new challenges.”

In July, Yamane and his team went with Nakao to explain directly to Inaba the project’s content. It was selected for implementation on the spot. In August, Yamane participated in a Naturally Plus Group management meeting at which he asked for support. In September, a Slack workspace was set up to test the concept. And volunteers from cooperating companies began exchanging messages with operating team members.

“Now (late November 2022) volunteers from every Naturally Plus Group company are exchanging messages with the 25 members of the operating team. We are now looking for what kinds of projects generate excitement. what barriers become bottlenecks to cooperation, and what features we need. All of this information will feed development of UNIVA’s own Group SNS.”

At present, individuals interested in communication between Group companies have already begun to use Slack to exchange ideas with each other. Let’s now hear how other members of the operating team feel about this project!

* Innovation Challenge Pitch is a system under which those with new project or business proposals can spend up to 20% of their hours at work on these ideas.

Real Voices Describe Experience with UNIVA SNS

Iwamura

What did you think when you first heard about the UNIVA SNS project?

UPC: Yukiko Iwamura (hereafter Iwamura)
“Because I was already wanting to communicate with NAKAMA in other companies, I was very happy when Yamane invited me to join the project team.”

Naturally Plus Hong Kong (NPHK): Kahong Shen, Tsubasa (hereafter Tsubasa)
“In my previous job I used an in-house SNS and found it very handy. When I joined NPHK the only tool for communication, even just inside the NP Group, was email. Honestly speaking, I felt that communication both inside and outside the Group was inconvenient. So, I was moved when I heard about this project. Not that the app used by NP members has progressed so much, we also need a faster, more convenient tool for communication among our employees.”

Has the experiment using Slack gone smoothly?

Tsubasa

Iwamura: “I am now a bit anxious that I don’t understand English well enough. I feel more at ease knowing that people from other countries know Japanese so well.”

Tsubasa: “Frankly, it still needs a lot of work, I feel. Everyone is still too hesitant and seem to feel embarrassed if they speak up. Still, I have high hopes!”

Can you be more specific about your hopes?

Iwamura: “At least, NAKAMA from different countries should be able to share information in real time. NAKAMA could form bands, participate in the Honolulu Marathon, or do something amazing together with retired OBs.”

Tsubasa: “I want to see both the volume and quality of work-related communication increase, to be able to make contact more easily than using email, to make everything feel faster. I would be happy to separate home and office. Thanks to participating in the experiment, I will be able to propose features that we really need.”

NAKAMA! Let’s All Get On Board and Make This Happen!

I myself, Juan Zheng participate in Slack. The sad fact is that I cannot say we have lively communication even just among 25 people. It is easy to set up a workspace, but a mountain of issues prevent long-lasting conversations. As participating members have noticed, the UNIVA CAPITAL Group is a multinational business in which language is a barrier to communication. Cultural differences are another major barrier. How can we break through these barriers? We asked Yamane.

“At UPC we have an in-house SNS called ‘Nakaniwa.’ At first it didn’t produce lively communication. Now more than half of our employees participate voluntarily. The heart of the matter is creating an environment that makes it easy to speak up. At UPC, 40 percent of our employees are not Japanese and the belief that it is important to speak properly, whether in Japanese or in some other languages, was a major hurdle preventing people from speaking up. That is why in developing the UNIVA SNS, we are considering including an automatic translation feature.”

Group companies operate in different time zones. Doesn’t this require appropriate regulation?

“Yes, that is now being discussed. We need to make sure that even when SNS is used during business hours, it doesn’t adversely affect the work that needs to be done. In the case of UPC’s Nakaniwa SNS, there are no limits on when communication occurs, inside or outside of business hours, and active conversations often occur early in the morning or late at night. That has made it necessary to take security measures to ensure the peace of mind of all our NAKAMA.”

Yamane says that emphasis is now being placed on increasing the number of participants by creating an environment that makes people want to sign up voluntarily for the service. The new SNS should be a platform with features like Facebook’s that make it easy to form communities and features like Twitter’s that make it possible for anyone to speak to the whole world.

“The goal is to have half of all our NAKAMA signed up within a year and a half after launch, with 30 percent of those active users. It will be ideal if conversations between companies lead to around 10 new proposals.”

Finally, a request for all our NAKAMA.

“For this project to go forward, we need more people to sign up and participate enthusiastically. We need the power of all of our NAKAMA pulling together. Only if we listen to the real voices of each and every one of us will the UNIVA SNS become a useful tool. Say to yourself, ‘This is for me!’ and join via Slack. Together we can construct a new UNIVA culture!!!”

To get involved use the link below. We look forward to meeting everyone on Slack.

Slack Participation Link:https://join.slack.com/t/univagroupsns-9mb6960/shared_invite/zt-1lrscge41-dxPkMk7aJ3GvsTdEhDRU8w