Viki is a web portal that provides video content with crowdsourced multi-lingual subtitles. It relies on an active community of fans to add captions and subtitles in numerous languages to premium videos (movies, television shows) from around the world — thus opening up new markets and enabling new viewers to enjoy the content. Leveraging crowd-sourced subtitling enables Viki to distribute non-English, non-US television content to foreign markets quickly and cheaply.
The case begins as Nadine Yap, vice president at Viki, prepares for a major redesign of the website to meet the requirements of the growing company. She laments that when the company fixes bugs or makes improvements, community members often complain and even leave. The community of fans and ‘subbers’ is at the heart of what Viki does, so staying authentic is crucial to the company’s sustainability. How should Yap and Viki go about maintaining the delicate balance between being an authentic site that is supported by an informal community and a slick, commercial operation?
This case can be used to explain the characteristics of crowdsourcing, especially as it applies to online video entertainment. It can also enable understanding the appropriate communication strategies to walk the fine line between scaling and looking “corporate” on the one hand, and staying “authentic” to the fans on the other.
A Stronger Focus on Communication Management
Communication is a critical foundation for planning and management. To that end, institutions have long focused on developing programmes that underscore the importance of communications management programmes, especially in an era of rapidly evolving technology and digitalisation.
In business, the ability to communicate isn’t just dependent on a manager’s communication skills. Choosing the right platform given the diversity of options today, understanding and following procedure and instructions, brevity, clarity and consistency are all factors that should be considered.
Implementing effective communication methods, processes, and tools will require an in-depth understanding of how communications management factors into the efficiency of your team and workplace. Armed with the right strategies and methodologies, an individual who can manage communications effectively is able to deliver output on time, ensure better cost-efficiency in the workplace, keep internal and external stakeholder engaged, and maintain morale and motivation in the office.
All business functions from finance, strategy, marketing, sales and even operations will achieve better optimized outcomes with good communication skills as they manage diverse stakeholders such as investors, employees, regulators, NGOs, mass media and across the various media platforms.
SMU Academy’s Graduate Certificate in Communication Management can help you move towards this goal. The program is recognized as Singapore’s more established communications management programme, drawing many enrollees from around the region annually.
Participants of the programme may also use the credits to work towards the SMU Master of Science in Communication Management. Click here to learn more.
Originally published by the SMU Centre for Management Practice, 13 Sep 2012 by Mark Chong and Kevin Sproule. Access the case in full here.
