No. 30 The Job of Webmaster(October 6, 2005)
beBit's clients are mainly those involved with the planning and operation of websites for major corporations and online companies, or the people referred to as “webmasters.” In this column, I would like to shine a spotlight on the job of the webmaster.
These days, the Internet is surpassing television and newspapers as the medium by which the consumer gathers information. The Internet is also bringing about considerable change in the business environment, where we are seeing trends such as pure Internet business prevailing over existing business.
For established companies, the Internet poses both opportunities and threats, and such companies see coping with the changes brought about by the Internet as an important challenge in running their business.
However, it has not yet been 10 years since the first company website got its start. There is still a lack of website planning and operation know-how within companies and across society as a whole. Under these difficult conditions where there is no supervisor or more experienced staff in-house to turn to, the reality is that these selected few, of whom the company is expecting so much, repeat the process of trial and error every day in website planning and management.
This is a fast-paced world in which there is nobody to turn to, no answers, and inconsistent levels of understanding of the Internet among company staff. Someone who puts themselves in this kind of chaos will certainly find the work rewarding, but at the same time must also find themselves in a very lonely position.
In addition to being in uncharted territory where there is no forerunner to help out, a person will not be able to succeed in his assignment if he does not have a broad and quite deep understanding of the various functions of a company, including sales, marketing, human recourses, advertising, IR, and more. Recently, the job of webmaster has become even more diversified, covering areas such as security measures, the protection of personal information, and corporate social responsibility, and at times he must get these all in place before the competitor does, placing immeasurable pressure on the person whose job it is to be webmaster.
Given these conditions, it is clear that the job of webmaster is one that requires information sharing and the accumulation of know-how beyond the borders of the company. In fact, an organization called the Business Research Institute has established just such a place, and is carrying out very significant activities.
Their seminar is called the Web Management Forum, but unlike the typical one-time seminar this seminar spends a year carrying out joint research and discussions on the role and challenges of a webmaster, sharing information and developing know-how. Covering an entire year, this seminar enables exchanges between the webmasters of participating companies. I believe the most significant aspect of this seminar is the sharing of information in a context of mutual trust.
beBit has served as an advisor since the first seminar, and each time we have found the discussions among the webmasters to be at an impressively high level and we have discovered that there are many things to learn from the approach of mutual study and teaching.
In new territory, sometimes it is necessary to go beyond the borders of the company to face the challenges that the new territory poses. Here at beBit, we too want to go beyond the borders of our work to contribute to the development of companies and the Internet.
Naoki Endo.
“2nd Web Management Forum”, sponsored by Business Research Institute.
For details, see: http://ns.bri.or.jp/pgdata/050063.pdf (Japanese only, in PDF format)
Organizers: Eisai Co., Ltd., Suntory Ltd., Shiseido Co., Ltd., NEC Corporation, Fujitsu Ltd., Ricoh Co., Ltd.
Member companies participating in 1st Forum: Astellas Pharma Inc., Idemitsu Kosan Co., Ltd., NTT DoCoMo, Kao Corporation, Canon Inc., KDDI Corporation, Toshiba Corporation, Pioneer Corporation, Hitachi Maxell, Ltd., Benesse Corporation, Honda Motor Co., Ltd., Matsushita Electric Industrial Co., Ltd., Mitsui & Co., Ltd., Yamaha Motor Co., Ltd., UCC Ueshima Coffee Co., Ltd., and many more
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