Mr. Kohara：

Our company mainly deals with remodeling and maintenance of the houses. We had converted into a corporation in 2004, and next year will be our 50th anniversary if we sum up the individual business years. We have total of 14 employees, 10 from sales-construction staffs and 4 from office workers. Since we are remodeling company, in which mainly focuses on construction, it is general that employees who form an estimation are also in charge of construction. Although I am the Representative Director of this company, I am also involved in overall working processes, from Sales to Construction works.

 

Ms. Kunihiro：

I am in charge of Sales business. Specifically, I am in charge of re-writing the estimates, which are initially written by other Sales employees or writing various documents down on PC.

Mr. Kohara：

Starting from one specific period, the core idea of construction within industry has changed from constructing new building to remodeling. Unlike constructing new building, remodeling requires considerable experience. As major companies are also taking part in remodeling industry, it has become impossible to survive from the industry with its similar tactic. In order to survive under such circumstance, it was important mission for us to enhance our work performance by working efficiently while providing quality service.

 

Even within the industry, the response rate has become faster than before. Take construction fee as an example, what used to be changed every five-year is now change each year. This indicates that we cannot survive this year with the same way as last year.

 

Meantime, there were issues with sharing information since the salesperson could not stay in the same construction site all day and could only visit maximum of five construction sites if needed. Customers often had to wait for the salesperson, who were not reachable while working at the construction site. Although the customers make phone calls, they still had to wait quite amount of time to be connected to the salesperson. Even with the note like ‘I want someone to come as soon as possible’, there were times when salesperson could not answer the message in a prompt manner. In order to find the salesperson who is available for immediate contact or the salesperson who can visit the place right away, we had to call each of them whenever needed. Because it was impossible to find out where each salesperson was located, we had to call each individual.

Ms. Kunihiro：

The most used situation is when we make responses to emergencies, such as water leakage and drain clogging. Especially, we receive a lot of inquiries about frozen pipes during winter time. Before introducing LINE WORKS, the employee who answered the customer phone call had to desperately find a Salesperson who can solve the emergency. After the introduction, however, we can now send customer address along with detailed situation explanation to the group chatting room, where entire Salesperson have jointed. Just by sending messages like ‘Can anyone go?’, we can immediately find available Salesperson to handle the situation.

 

Mr. Kohara：

Up until now, we have delivered the information such as customer requests, shipping information, and event information through bylaws. After introducing LINE WORKS, however, it became very convenient to notify all the employees. Also, there are employees whom we get to encounter only once a week, but even in such situation, we can communicate with them in detail.

 

We are utilizing Calendar function when writing daily work log. There is no difference in terms of its function to manage overall schedules by posting construction or customer meeting dates in advance. We, furthermore, use to adjust the schedules, such as change the presumably written schedule hours to the hours that actually took, and add types of works that employees have done.

 

That is, what once was pre-conditioned schedule in the morning transformed into employees’ daily work log at night. It is easy to see the works done on that day and it is also convenient for future reference. Hand-written work log was often omitted within the day. But, it is now possible to check the log whenever and wherever needed.

 

Mr. Kohara：

LINE WORKS is very attractive tool in terms of allowing us to check the schedule everywhere. This applies to all the employees, but as we start utilizing LINE WORKS within our workplace, I believe that we all gained notion of time management. Everyone, including myself, can now use time efficiently. Schedule management function as well as Timer function also prevent works from being left out.

 

Ms. Kunihiro：

Before LINE WORKS was introduced, I wrote employees’ schedule simply on a paper chart in the office. By introducing LINE WORKS, we are also digitalized. It became possible to reduce the cost of ‘writing’ as well as paper. Also, it is possible to make immediate contact to the specific employee, as we can find out the current location of them in detail.

Mr. Kohara：

What I felt particularly effective in terms of communication is when confirming ‘finishing touches’ of the construction sites. Visiting all the construction sites is nearly impossible to do so. However, since site managers send photos through LINE WORKS chatting, it is now possible to acknowledge the details of the construction sites without making actual visits.

 

There were times when I could not make judgements on the situation and issue the work instructions accordingly if I was not present on the site. But, now I can instantly make judgements on the issue and deliver the instructions. Because I can also issue instructions immediately in case of any emergencies or problems, the overall working process became much favorable than before. It was impossible to do so in the past. As we reduced the amount of time wasted, we can now spend more time focusing on Sales activities, such as prospect customer development, consultation, and post-sales support. We can easily share messages through chatting room, and ‘completed’ message can now be sent after the work has done. We are deeply feeling that the style of work has changed.

 

It may sound exaggerated, but I believe that with the help of LINE WORKS, we could survive from the hardships that we faced at the end of the last year. Starting from the end of the last year, the entire construction industry became relatively busy. Specifically, the work has increased 125% more in December than the last year. Thanks to LINE WORKS, we could successfully handle all the chances given by reducing the wasted time. After the introduction, our achievement record has definitely improved than last year.

Mr. Ono：

Located in Kanagawa, our company operates the visiting rehabilitation massage business by a masseur who owns national certificate. We also operate stress-relieving salon that lessens daily tiredness or muscle stiffness using five senses and other related business. We are operating 8 visiting rehabilitation massage stores and 5 stress-relieving salon stores.

 

Mr. Takeuchi：

I am part of the General Affairs Department, and responsible for managing the company’s vehicle, PCs, and company borrowed cellular phones.

 

Mr. Hasegawa：

I am in charge of visiting rehabilitation massage business. In addition, I visit customer’s house as a masseur and I manage the schedule of staff members as head of the office, simultaneously.

Mr. Ono：

The number of employees who were only a few at the company’s foundation year in 2000 has now grown up to 130 employees. As the company’s size grew year after year, we believed that the speed of communication would become more important than before. Also, we value people as we put a company’s fundamental policy. Especially, in hopes of improving capacity and becoming outstanding individuals, we actively have been conducting the training workshop for executive staffs.

 

We all felt that, in order to work faster, it is important to make quick responses to the contacts. We think that there are limitations to enhance response rates using communication tools like email or telephone. Until now, the employees have used bulletin boards on the company’s website installed by each Department manager. Field employees, those who have hard time to meet each other due to different work time, used company’s SNS to contact each other. We thought that introducing a convenient communication tool may enhance communication speed than before.

 

Mr. Hasegawa：

It was only morning hours that I can physically meet the employees. For this reason, I basically contacted them through company mobile phone or personal mobile phone. However, I often felt uncomfortable with this due to time limitation.

 

Mr. Takeuchi：

We have used SMS since we rented out 2G phones to our employees up until now. However, I felt that SMS as well as 2G phones were inconvenient to use because contacts need to be re-registered every time when device changes.

Mr. Takeuchi：

In the fall of 2017, the company introduced LINE WORKS as we changed the company rental mobile phone from 2G phone to smartphone. LINE WORKS, an application available both on the PC and smartphone, was very attractive because we wanted to create an environment where office employees can easily communicate with field employees. I looked over several different tools. However, I gave up on introducing them because employees were unable to get used to them in the trial and there was a need for the training session in order to make every employee member be proficient.

 

Mr. Hasegawa：

LINE WORKS provides video call feature, and it has been a crucial factor to introduce it since Mr. Ono wanted to hold a video conference. LINE WORKS, unlike other traditional communication tools, was also very attractive because it provides Read notification feature to find out whether a message has been read or not.

 

Mr. Ono：

When we introduce LINE WORKS, the internal IT Department set up rules such as ‘Messages that arrive after 8 p.m. can be answered the next morning’ or ‘No need to use closing remarks at the end of the message’ to make LINE WORKS usage pleasant. In addition, each business unit came up with different ideas to make a variety of uses of LINE WORKS.

Mr. Ono：

Currently, a total of 32 employees in administrative positions like senior executives, director of each sales office, and store manager are using LINE WORKS. we can send opinions to the executives easily as well as accommodate with executives’ opinion better than before. Also, there are executives who exchange personal information like ‘My baby has born’ or upload company PR videos via LINE WORKS to share information actively. Our company values ‘A well-communicated environment’ as the most important measure and we think that LINE WORKS is making a huge contribution to create such environment. Up until now, we have been hearing from employees through face to face interviews or written survey. However, I think we will be able to take advantage of LINE WORKS Form functions near in the future.

Mr. Hasegawa：

If the customer is in bad condition and cancel the visiting schedule on that day, we need to make contact immediately to field employees, who are assigned to visit the customer’s house. We can make contacts faster through LINE WORKS than by phone or email. Also, if the sent messages are notified as read, we can assure that ‘the recipients have read the message’, even if there is no reply.

 

There are times when we care for customers with a team of external physical therapists or occupational therapists whom are contracted by care managers. And we are mostly using LINE WORKS to make connection to their LINE account and exchange information in real time. Up to this point, the telephone calls have been central to our communication. But, there was a limited amount of time to receive the call and communicate through the phone. Therefore, we often had to call several times to find the most suitable time for communication. After the introduction of LINE WORKS, communication became smoother.Also, we can share customer’s health status and family situations on team’s group chatting room, which enables to achieve care system with better customer satisfaction measurement.

 

Mr. Takeuchi：

Because LINE WORKS enables us to find out whether the message has been read or not, we can make decisions faster than before. If an emergency situation occurs at the field we visit, we have to contact our boss about the issue and ask for the solution. When doing so, if we find out the message is not read by the boss, we can immediately make judgement to contact another boss and ask for the resolution. And this is very convenient.

Mr. Takeuchi：

LINE WORKS made company’s overall communication more active than before because it is easier to express an opinion than email or telephone. In order to confirm each other’s opinion, we use LINE WORKS, which has fast response speed and we can use the appropriate tool for purpose with the contact that needs searching or accumulation can be done by email.

Mr. Hasegawa：

We have discussed various company-level agendas such as new plans and responses through face-to-face meetings. But, now we are actively using LINE WORKS Message function to do so. As a result, face-to-face meetings have turned from a discussion to decision making and final confirmation, allowing more time to spend efficiently. The introduction of LINE WORKS created an atmosphere for the new director to express their opinion freely.

 

Mr. Ono：

We believe that the adoption of LINE WORKS enabled us to achieve a ‘well-communicated environment = better working environment’ and strengthened the connection between our executives. As more and more employees are now expressing their opinions, I think I can hear about them more when compared with past years. Communication and decision-making procedures are certainly faster than before, and we expect that these changes can lead us to better performance in the future.

Mr. Maruyama：

Our company raise milk cow and deliver 13 to 15 tons of milk daily. Myself, as a leader of the farm, I am taking leading roles in financial and production management.

 

Mr. Okada：

I am in charge of overall management of the farm, including taking care of the calves and cows, as well as the employees working on site.

 

Ms. Hasegawa：

I am in charge of managing feedstuffs for milk cows.

Mr. Maruyama：

Since the average age of the employees is about 25-26, which is comparatively younger generation, we previously used LINE as a company communication tool. What was the most problematic at that time was sending the wrong messages. In the past, because we were using the LINE for both private and business purpose, there was problem like sending the message to the colleagues, instead of sending it to the friends. It was risky and unstable in security perspective since we often share confidential information through messenger.

 

Also, in order to notify the symptom of the diseased milk cow in detail as well as to share professional information about the machine and facilities, we often share photos and videos through LINE. However, what we found problematic with LINE was that it was impossible to archive those attachments. For this reason, we hoped to use the business version of LINE if launched.

Mr. Maruyama：

Our company is planning to expand the business, and in the same sense, we are planning to increase the number of employees up to 100 near in the future. To build an organization and make improvements to the communication tool, we have been thinking that an IT tool should be introduced to our company.

 

While searching for a business communication tool that is similar to LINE, we found LINE WORKS on the internet. Because LINE WORKS enables us to manage all the employees based on their positions, we believed that this would help us constructing organization. Also, as a ‘business version of LINE’, it sounded interesting to us. Those who are working at the farm are not all IT intelligent, and therefore, maybe a few employees who are having hard time memorizing the usage of the new tool. If it were LINE WORKS, however, we believed that employees soon be able to get accustomed to the tool due to its similarities of LINE.

Ms. Hasegawa：

Honestly, I was a bit nervous about having another application since I am not good at using machines and internet. But, as I start to use LINE WORKS, I realized that it was easy-to-use. Also, it was not having group chatting rooms inside LINE, but having them inside the LINE WORKS. This enabled us to share information much easier. Because we are using two different applications, it was good to have different notifications, since it allows us to find out whether the message is for private or business purpose.

Mr. Maruyama：

Our company encourages not only the employees but also mechanics and vets to make LINE WORKS accounts. If one of our machines is broken, we can directly send messages to the chatting room, in which mechanics as well as related people are also participating. This way, everyone can figure out the issue immediately, and does not forget to order pieces for repair. In addition, as all the employees share both symptoms and medical record of diseased cow through LINE WORKS, even with those who were not at the office could respond promptly to such issue. This has also contributed to maintain the health of the cow.

Mr. Okada：

We share information about milk cows’ childbirth as well as daily issues through messenger. We also upload meeting logs to the board. Previously, if we had a meeting with specific employees or project members, we used to print out the computer-written meeting logs and told the employees to write names on the paper if they read the log. With LINE WORKS board, however, it allows us to read the meeting log whenever we want and we can also find out whether every employee has read the log or not.

 

Ms. Hasegawa：

I am sharing information with all the employees with regards to feeding the milk cows. We decide the amount of the feed to give to the milk cow next day, based on how much did the milk cows eat their feeds on the day. And bad conditioned feed is one of the reasons to consider. We constantly share information in order to track what are the ingredients are included in the feed and act accordingly to it.

After the introduction of LINE WORKS, various changes are made to our company, and it helped us with efficient working as well as human resource management.

 

Because it is a tool that we use on a daily basis, we can follow the rules regularly

In order to keep the resting place for cows as clean as possible, we put sawdust on the cow bed. Before using LINE WORKS, random employees, who thought about changing the sawdust did the cleaning once in two years. But, after the introduction, we started to write the cleaning schedule on the Calendar to do the cleaning once every three months. As a result, we could sustain the beddings for the cows clean and ultimately, we could also reduce the possibilities of cows getting diseases.

 

 

We can save unnecessary time for travel since we are able to check about 200 manuals using smartphone

We have about 200 manuals on the works needed in the farm, such as milking and coping method for cow disease. Before the introduction, all the manuals are saved on the computers located inside the office. For this reason, we had to go to the office to check the manual. After introduction, however, it became much comfortable for us since we can save all the manuals at the drive and download them on my smartphone whenever wanted.

 

‘Listening to opinion’ has become our new culture. And, with this, we could successfully finish our cleaning project!

We had a problem keeping the farm clean and neat for a long time. After the introduction of LINE WORKS, however, we came up with a goal to make a successful story of making our farm clean. We immediately started an organization and cleaning project using the Note feature. The employees first visited and inspected the clean farms as an example, and we shared reports with photos attached to the Note in order to decide which farm to take it as an example. Furthermore, we conducted a survey asking questions like what are the problems at our farm and which part of our farm should be cleaned. Two months later, we could successfully finish our cleaning project and keep our farm clean. In fact, the project was meant to be started 3 years ago, but it did not go well at the time. Because we could gather up all the employees’ ideas and thoughts in one place, there was no detailed idea made regarding the project. With Note and Survey feature, we could share thoughts and ideas and listen to others as well. We believe this motivated all the employees in our company.

 

We were able to create a business credo that reflects the will of the employees

As the number of employees increase, we were constantly thinking about documenting the company’s business credo as well as value of the farm with the aim of keeping our corporate climate strong and tight. To do this, all the employees gathered through the LINE WORKS Survey feature. All the employees answered what they thought about the social significance and responsibility of Asagiri Maple Farm. Before the introduction of LINE WORKS, employee’ comments were received via written memo or verbal communication. Also, we had to fill the excel form to accumulate the survey result. The overall process was burdening for all of us. We also had difficulty communicating opinion with others. LINE WORKS survey, however, was very easy to use. Because collecting and sharing opinion became so easy, the feature has enabled us to create our business credo together with our employees.

By sharing and checking up calves’ birth in real time, the calves’ fatal death rate has been reduced from 10% to 5%.

Our company had a mission to reduce the calves’ fatal death rate since we had a bit higher rate when compared with other farms. For this reason, we started to use LINE WORKS Messenger feature to increase the frequency of observing cows and share the situation in real-time. As all the employees are able to acknowledge about the condition of the cows, we could be more cautious and pay more attention to those cows. About 6 months after the introducing LINE WORKS, we could reduce the fatal death rate from 10% to 5%.

Mr. Maruyama：

As information sharing became smoother, we can process all the projects harmoniously. In corporate perspective, growth rate as well as group gathering force have also increased. Moreover, as we can now manage our work, efficiency of production management has improved, which is positive change made to our company.

Mr. Shou :

Our company is a creative company, centering client works. We are in charge of consulting services such as analysis, strategy design and planning in marketing and communication that companies and administrative organizations, brands and products require. And, we are also in charge of production works, actually produce and deploy works according to the plan. In the marketing or creative field, It is common to divide into two types of companies. There are companies only taking responsible for strategy and planning, while some other companies are dealing with production solely. Unlike this, our company deals with both, and therefore one-stop operation is one of our company’s characteristics.

Mr. Shou :

In the past, there was a lot of communication held via email, SNS messenger, and phone calls. Basically, checking the document and its data has been carried out by attaching to mail or SNS. Except for some projects, schedules were managed in a very analog way, such as checking at the meeting or filling out the whiteboard.

 

First of all, the first problems was that it took significant amount of time when confirming various types of information. To take our company as an example, either the designs or products can be opened to the public only after the president confirmed to be okay.

 

Mr. Kazuo :

Modifying schedules and information sharing has become convenient. Since we now can see the schedules of all the employees, it is very helpful when scheduling. We can simply modify the schedule just by sending ‘Are you available at this time?’. Also, when holding a meeting, we can share the agenda through Home function and make sure all the meeting participants check, bring idea and opinion about the agenda and even think of the result in advance. By doing so, we found that the time we spent on the meeting have decreased than the past.

 

Mr. Shou :

What has changed the most is that we now rarely use email or SNS for company communication. We did not force to quit using such tool. Instead, it vanished naturally, and started to use LINE WORKS as an alternatives. We encouraged employees to make chatting room per each project. This way, we can follow up the overall process of project simply by checking the messages inside the chatting room. This is very efficient way of working. When sharing information or document, we are also attaching the files to the chatting room. It also possible to instantly check the attached files at the chatting room using LINE WORKS viewer.

 

After that, we can either send comments on the documents or just simply send okay sticker to the chatting room when there is no extra issues to be discussed. Like this, remote communication gets faster than before. We no longer have to wait for our president to come back to the office for the confirmation. And, this led all the employees to process and finish their work faster. Similar to this, it was general to make comments like ‘Let’s talk about this after returning to the office’ or ‘Let’s share this agenda at the office’. Just by using chatting room, however, we can immediately have conversation. With this, we rarely hold quick face-to-face meeting, standing in the corner of the office. In fact, in the field of creative works, efficiency and short working time cannot go along with quality. I used to work at the office until late night during peak season. But after the introduction of LINE WORKS, the finishing time has shortened overwhelmingly. I felt that as more spare time the employees have, the better productivity the entire company have.