ACCJ VIRTUAL EVENT
The 2020 Kansai Diversity & Inclusion Summit Series Driving business: inclusive leadership in new ways of working By Malcolm Foster
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ndaunted by the pandemic, the Kansai chapter of the American Chamber of Commerce in Japan (ACCJ) successfully pulled off a virtual Diversity & Inclusion Summit with a record number of participants, many of whom gave positive reviews and, perhaps surprisingly, expressed gratitude for networking opportunities despite the digital distance. Past summits were a half-day affair featuring one keynote speaker followed by plenary sessions, breakout sessions, and a reception. The format proved popular, but this time the event was split into three two-hour online sessions over successive weeks in late October and early November, each with its own keynote speaker, small-group discussions, and some practical training. That essentially gave participants three shorter events for the price of one longer one. Attendees seemed to like that
flexibility and the opportunity to hear more speakers, according to ACCJ-Kansai Diversity and Inclusion Committee CoChair Yuka Nakamura, who works in Eli Lilly’s dermatology marketing group. All told, more than 320 people registered, a strong boost compared with last year’s 224, some 200–250 people joining each of the three sessions. Nakamura attributes the increased interest to the online format, which made it “easier for people to join instead of committing a half-day, physically, to the event,” as well as the opportunity to hear three speakers. SHOWSTOPPER Orchestrating the multi-day event, however, involved far more work than in previous years, Nakamura said. One big change was adjusting to the technical aspects of connecting everyone on Cisco System’s Webex and ensuring that the speaker could be clearly seen and heard. Saying that “technical issues can really be a showstopper,” she mentioned that they “had lots of dry runs for all three days.” During the real thing, there were a few minor hitches in coordinating slides with the keynote speakers’ presentations, but the seminars largely went smoothly, thanks to enormous help from the ACCJ communications staff. One advantage of having three speakers was that they gave differing perspectives on diversity and were, themselves, from diverse backgrounds: Japanese and foreign, male and female, representing major companies and startups.
Yuka Nakamura ACCJ-Kansai Diversity and Inclusion Committee Co-Chair Kathy Matsui
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THE ACCJ JOURNAL
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DECEMBER 2020
