Global firm bridges distance and languages to reach 80% of staff

Using prerecorded video of CEO town halls, Belden adds voiceovers and subtitles in 10 translations. It then gathers its dispersed teams for focused viewings in multiple sites.

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Trouble getting your troops aligned with your CEO’s marching orders? Time for a town hall meeting to straighten them out.

But what if your organization spans multiple countries, time zones, cultures and languages? Should you throw in the towel and rely on old-fashioned communication cascades?

Belden Inc. has found a way to transcend geographic and language differences and reach nearly 80% of its 10,000 employees worldwide.

A St. Louis manufacturer of high-end networking, connectivity and cable products, Belden combines onsite meetings with translated videos of town halls featuring CEO John Stroup, says Corporate Communications Manager Michelle Foster.

For each town hall, Foster coordinates Stroup’s travel to one of the company’s global locations and records a meeting before a live audience. A senior business leader appropriate to that location facilitates the discussion.“ We produce the video and send it out to be translated it into 10 languages, and we distribute that,” Foster says.

Reaching non-English speakers

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