Sansan, Chatwork, Yapuri CTO talks about communication theory for engineers

My name is Kai Fujisawa and I am in charge of public relations and recruitment.

I attended CTOnight held at Yahoo Osaka on September 6, 2019

[Communication theory talked about by Sansan, Chatwork, and Yapuri CTO (MixLeap special edition)]

Part 3 of CTO Night KANSAI where CTOs from various companies talk about their own products + communication!

So, as a non-engineer, I was wondering how to communicate with the engineers in my company and the engineers I would meet at study sessions, when a wonderful event happened. The general participation slot was full, so I applied for the blog slot and off we went.

▼The venue is Yahoo's office on the top floor of Grand Front. The night view is amazing.

What is CTOnight?

▼About 130 people participated this time, and some who are CTOs at venture companies were also eager to ask questions.

We invited CTOs (Chief Technology Officers) from technology companies to discuss how top engineers at each company face their own products, both as individuals and as an organization. We will invite all CTOs to gather and have a discussion.

Source: Yahoo! JAPAN Osaka connpass

This is a very luxurious event where you can hear from CTOs from three companies in one night.

CTOs from three companies talk about communication

are Mr. Fujikura of Sansan Co., Ltd. which provides cloud business card management service "Sansan" Chatwork Co., Ltd. Mr. Sano of Yapri Co., Ltd., which provides cloud-based app development. appeared and talked about the way communication between the three parties should be.

▼Mr. Seita Fujikura (Sansan Co., Ltd. Executive Officer/CTO)

▼Masayoshi Yamamoto (Chatwork Co., Ltd. CEO and CTO)

▼Masashi Sano (CTO, Yapuri Co., Ltd.)

Commitment to communication as a CTO

The first question was, "Are there any things you are particular about as a CTO regarding communication?"

Chat work Yamamoto-san

Since I am an engineer myself, I try to convince why I am writing the code Then, we dig deep into internal opinions and think about what users really want. It is important to motivate engineers in this way.

What I hate the most is managing based on the information gap. I am conscious of making management transparent , rather than just telling people from above to do this or that Close the progress and discuss the facts so that you can make the same decisions as your manager. Then you can decide whether to do it or not.

Also, since I believe in always having humor in my heart, I also place a lot of emphasis on whether my content will be popular or not, even in chats. I think ideas are born where there is humor

Things to keep in mind when communicating within your company

Mr. Yapri Sano

I'm careful about what I say because what I say can be more easily influenced than I think. I don't wear earphones so that people around me can easily talk to me . I usually work side by side with other members of the company.

Chat work Yamamoto-san

I try not to use phrases like ``Maybe this is good?'' or ``Personally, I think this.'' Because people tend to think , "That's what the president thinks!"

It's difficult to communicate with everyone, so we have a ``chat'' session Strange things are thrown into it every day, so I add it in.

How will communication change in the future?

sansan Fujikura-san

No, I don't know anymore. In addition to oral communication, there were also line stamps, but I was the one who said wow! I thought of Niconico Douga . This is communication that transcends time and space. I get excited when I think about new communication tools coming out.

Chat work Yamamoto-san

synchronous communication will only be used when it is important and urgent, and asynchronous communication will increase in the future. Synchronous can be viewed over the phone, asynchronous can be viewed later via chat or email.

I wish I could decide how to use my time, but if my extension rings while I'm writing code, I can't use my time freely. I want to create a society where people can decide how to communicate so that they can concentrate as much as possible when they want to. It also increases productivity, and I think business chat is effective in that regard.

There are companies that emphasize face-to-face communication and , ``Look people in the eye and talk to them! No chatting!'' Face-to-face communication contains a huge amount of information, but it is inefficient . You need time and space. So, we communicate digitally to increase the amount of time we spend talking in analog. It's digital to create time to talk in analog. Some people think that cold communication such as email and chat has increased, but I think that's not the case.On the contrary, I think we are living in an era where analogue methods are being put to good use.

It's also important to communicate by using information sharing and emotional sharing, and I think it's best to share information efficiently and creatively in an analog way.

Mr. Yapri Sano

I believe that new forms of communication that we could never have imagined will emerge in the future. At that time, you can try out something that you think, ``I don't know what it can be used for, but it seems interesting,'' and even if you fail, you can experience what went wrong, or you can play around with new technology on your own. I think that watching and accumulating information

I also think that consideration is important, and I think non-engineers often ask engineers to ``do this'' or ``do that.'' While non-engineers do things in an inefficient way, engineers can easily create something convenient , so instead of saying, ``That person said something troublesome,'' the other person's I think it's important for engineers to communicate when they're having trouble.

Tools for sharing emotions

Chat work Yamamoto-san

I think it's quite possible to have a meeting via chat, but there are some meetings that can't be held. For example, I don't think it would be very convenient to do morning meetings, kick-offs, brainstorming, reflections, etc. via chat.

When doing creative work, there is a lot of mutual information exchange, so it can be tiring to brainstorm over chat, but as you talk, you can share how your excitement goes up and down and say, ``That's interesting!'' So I think that's the good thing about face-to-face meetings. It's tiring to do 1on1 via chat (lol)

sansan Fujikura-san

As an engineer myself, I feel that current technology has not kept up with real communication. I think the point of discussion is how to use technology to reproduce something like ``communicating emotions''. Even if you have a face-to-face conversation, there can be misunderstandings, right? Husbands and wives even fight. I would like to see technology improve real-life communication even further, , ``Back in the days when such things didn't exist, couples would just walk past each other.''

Chat work Yamamoto-san

When I thought about what kind of technology that was, I learned that the average American couple consults a counselor when they fight. If you're a married couple, you'll end up using sales words and buying words, and you'll end up saying, ``Oh!'', but if you consult with a third party, you can be objective. I thought it was a technology like listening to each other using smart speakers or something like that (lol)

Communication that only engineers can do

Mr. Yapri Sano

I think I can demonstrate through the things I create , such as paying attention to details and doing things without being asked I think it's unique to engineers that when I see someone having a problem in chat, I secretly make something for them.

Chat work Yamamoto-san

This is my personal opinion, but I think engineers are suitable for managers Engineers are good at being abstract-oriented, aren't they? I think this can be found in everyday communication as well. I think it's great to be able to communicate by switching between abstraction and concreteness, such as creating departments by standardizing unnecessary parts of an organization, and thinking that this and that are in a loop.

sansan Fujikura-san

I think so too, and as an engineer, most of the things we use on a daily basis are things that don't physically exist and don't have a tangible feel to them The resulting output doesn't even have a tangible feel to it. Therefore, discussions between engineers are always lively. Every day, I try to figure out how to structure this, communicate it to the other person, create a common understanding, and have a discussion. I think the people who continue to grow as engineers are the ones who are good at things like that.

Whether it's sales or marketing, the problems faced in the business are almost invisible. I think that people who are successful in society are usually people who are good at those things. Engineers are forced to do this from their first year in the workforce. So I think it would be advantageous.

▼After the panel discussion, there was a social gathering. Mix leap social gatherings are always lively!

summary

At a social gathering, I asked Mr. Fujikura from sansan, ``As a non-engineer, how should I communicate with engineers?'', and he answered, ``Don't think about the fact that he's an engineer, just trust him completely.'' I received a saying that says, " Just do it and fall in love with it." I think that's really true. It made me realize that the basis of communication, both inside and outside the company, is to trust the other person.

At this CTO Night, the chief technology officer of an IT company talked about communication. It was a luxury to be able to listen to so much content in one night, and I thought it was cool to see all three of them talking about it, even if it's just a simple comment. Thank you to Yahoo for always planning such interesting events! We will continue to visit Mix leap from now on! !